News - Microsoft Windows 8 to drop 'Aero'

[Saracen]

What do our readers think? Is the loss of Aero for the sake of simplicity and/or performance a good thing?

This reader thinks Win 8 is looking less appealing by the day, or at least, by the announcement.

Personally, I couldn't give a hoot about what appears to be a strategic objective, which is about a common look/feel from everything from mega-power games machines to mobile phones. I quite like Aero. It may suck down some performance power, but not to the point that it adversely affects anything else I do in a meaningful way.

And besides, I fully agree with several posters above that have said, basically, give users the choice to enable it or not. Windows 8 is going to have to be awfully damn good in some other ways (that I haven't yet noticed) to get me to spring for an upgrade fee. Right now, W7 is doing everything I need, and I don't see any reason to change up .... and several reasons not to.

[Pleiades]

I guess it'll mean more traffic @ Windowblinds at least: http://www.stardock.com/products/windowblinds/

I never really understood the need to use third party software to 'customize' the desktop, but maybe Windows 8 will change my mind...

[abaxas]

Bling doesnt make you work any faster.

[Hicks12]

Still confused because since it is in the beta release, it means they have wasted all that time implementing it! They may aswell just put in a simile on or off... you know much like we can on windows 7? I like the minimalistic view but to really already have some nice designs implemented and then just say no remove that crap we cant handle it, is a slap in the face!.

[OilSheikh]

One more reason to not to upgrade to Win8

[=assassin=]

I quite like Aero, although I can live without it - but this just seems like yet another step back with Windows 8. I really hope it bombs, as they seem to be going in completely the wrong direction to me.

[crossy]

Bling doesnt make you work any faster.

True, it doesn't make you more productive - but you've got to make a distinction between needless "twiddles" and aspects that add to the utility of the UI. Take for example transparent windows - sure for some it's a needless tweak, but if you're able to see an error dialog that's popped under a window (I've had it happen) then it becomes useful.

What worries me is that we're seeing an unsuitable UI forced Stalin-like across the board. Standards are good, but you can take them too far and create something that looks like it was designed in North Korea.

[jim]

Are they actually pulling Aero, or just the transparent windows?

Aero Snap for instance is a fantastic feature.

[Noxvayl]

Currently running the Windows 8 Consumer Preview that has Aero. I must admit that I won't really miss it but since this version has it why can't they provide the option to enable it if you want? Seems stupid not to.

[TheAnimus]

Currently running the Windows 8 Consumer Preview that has Aero. I must admit that I won't really miss it but since this version has it why can't they provide the option to enable it if you want? Seems stupid not to.

Because the exact same people that complain about the size of the binaries of your windows folder will be complaining.

If they don't have it on all machines programmers life is harder, we have more to ensure compatibility.

There is also more room for bugs, less code is better, less chance for security issues, less change for bsods......

It really makes sense to remove un-used features!

[Noxvayl]

@ TheAnimus

That is all well and good but I probably use less than 60% of the functions Windows has installed... by the same logic they need to be removing that crap as well. Considering this is simply aesthetic I'm not convinced it poses enough of an issue for bugs in the code or for the file size of the install. My installation already takes up 16Gb, I doubt having both Aero and the plain style windows options will inflate that enough for people to notice.

[GoodApollo]

Just like them removing the start menu, it'd make far more sense just to give the user an option to use it or not.
Feels like they're adding and then removing things for the sake of it to me.

[peterb]

Well, I won't miss that intensley irritating 'feature' of a pane suddenly maximising whenever I drag it near the top of the screen so I can see something underneath, or the transparency either, or the minimal menus, in fact, thinking about it...

Call me a Luddite but I say "function over style, please". Give me familiarity, clarity and efficient use of screen space any day. In other words, as long as I can revert any new Windows to look like Win 2000 then I can be a happy bunny. ;o)

pretty much sums up my feelings about it.

But I won't be moving to it anyway. I bypassed XP and Vista, so I expect I will bypass Windows 8 and 9.

[Biscuit]

Are they actually pulling Aero, or just the transparent windows?

Aero Snap for instance is a fantastic feature.

I would like to know this too. I use windows and arrow keys to automatically move windows around all the time.
Although the desktop features they mentioned the other day sounded quite good, they need to be careful they don't create another vista/me.
Windows 7 is pretty good, pretty solid and widely used. People and companies will need a good reason to upgrade and if it's not there they won't do it, the past has proved this.

[Fraz]

What amazes me is that apparently they are still making these decisions so close to the release date.

Frankly I'm moving wholesale away from Windows except for gaming. Microsoft couldn't even get the gaming side of things right (remember the pathetic Games for Windows attempt?). It's Steam that saved the day for them there, I think.

Anyway, Linux Mint is the way forward for me, I think. Unity means that Ubuntu is out of the list of options. Windows 8 looks like a really really bad joke. I'm beginning to wonder if there is some kind of brain rot going around that only affects operating system UI designers.

[crossy]

Frankly I'm moving wholesale away from Windows except for gaming. Microsoft couldn't even get the gaming side of things right (remember the pathetic Games for Windows attempt?). It's Steam that saved the day for them there, I think. Anyway, Linux Mint is the way forward for me, I think. Unity means that Ubuntu is out of the list of options. Windows 8 looks like a really really bad joke. I'm beginning to wonder if there is some kind of brain rot going around that only affects operating system UI designers.

Agree with you totally - like you my Windows box has now been downgraded to games and a very few Windows-only programs. For the mail, browsing etc an Ubuntu box is a whole lot less annoying (boots faster, closes faster, updates aren't so invasive, bsod is almost unknown). Other people (non techies too!) have had the same experience - live USB sticks are a great way to show folks Linux. (I use Mint for that!)

It might be off-topic, but I'd heard that Canonical had "radically" revised Unity - presumably in light of the roasting they got - and that 12.04's version is actually quite "usable". I'll reserve judgement until I've had time to try it - although I'll freely admit that previous experiences have very much soured me on Unity. Since I installed Gnome-Do on my current (10.04LTS) Ubuntu box I'm quite keen to give this "HUD" feature a spin.

Given some of the boneheaded decisions being made by UI designers these days, I've got to wonder whether they're doing any user testing (note NOT "focus groups"!) and if so, what kind of mutants they're using for it.

Like a lot of folks here, I now can't see a convincing reason to rush out and buy Windows 8 - so unless someone's going to point out that "got to have" feature that I've somehow missed, then I'll be saving my money for Windows 9. Assuming of course that Steam for Ubuntu hasn't arrived in the meantime.