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Originally Posted by knottyjabe

We had a good thing going for a few years... Maybe time to stick some Win 7 pro copies in carbonite for a rainy day!

Good day,
Not a bad plan... but there are a few wrinkles with this:

1. With UEFI and if it is enforced, then Win 7 (or any other old O/S) may be prevented from booting. However, with the efforts from the Linux crowd, this may be mitigated, but it is still a possibility.

2. With new hardware comes the need for drivers... and if the hardware drivers are not supported in Win 7, then you are somewhat hooped.

Now this all may be somewhat moot, as Win 7 "should" be around for a number of years yet. I believe XP support officially ends in 2014... XP support has been pushed back (I think twice now) do to some "influence" by some large Corporate customers and so that would mean Win 7 should be here until 2016+ (?? I am just guessing here). Now, whether you can still buy hardware to run Win 7 in the future is still up for debate.

Cheers,

Sam

We had a good thing going for a few years... Maybe time to stick some Win 7 pro copies in carbonite for a rainy day!

Originally Posted by jrevans

Thanks for the info Sam.

I was irked when I read about UEFI since I'm a big Linux user, so I'm glad to hear that a solution with the pre-bootloader is being developed.

Jim

Good day Jim,

You are most welcome!

I am just saddened that there has been very little published regarding all of this Microsoft big brother nonsense. I do not know if it is just me, but I take great offense to these bullying Microsoft tactics all in guise of "security"... I say this as most of the Win 8 reviews tend to not mention these "security benefits", ahem, and how much impact they will and are creating... Hopefully more information will surface and more users push back so that some of the overly nasty "benefits" will be removed or at least be modifiable by the end user. After all it is user's hardware and they should be able to operate whatever O/S, etc they wish.

Cheers,

Sam

Originally Posted by s2sam

Good day all,

I am hoping this does not come off as a rant, but there are some things brewing that could have some significant impact on the PC industry as well as industries that use PCs...
<snip>
Thankfully, there is work in the community to arrive at a solution:

http://www.linuxfoundation.org/news-...em-open-source
Sam

Thanks for the info Sam.

I was irked when I read about UEFI since I'm a big Linux user, so I'm glad to hear that a solution with the pre-bootloader is being developed.

Jim

Secure Boot (UEFI) may be Enforced in new Computer Hardware

Good day all,

I am hoping this does not come off as a rant, but there are some things brewing that could have some significant impact on the PC industry as well as industries that use PCs...

It looks like things are getting a bit more muddy and potentially a whole lot more complicated for users who wish to use new computers with older O/S's (Windows or Linux). You see there is a push by Microsoft (mainly) to force computer manufacturers to use a new Secure boot system (UEFI) embedded within the computer's motherboard. Basically this is low level firmware within the system BIOS (actually this is a new BIOS called UEFI) which verifies that the bootable software (O/S, etc) has not been tampered with. It verifies the boot software(O/S) via a Security Certificate (as I mentioned in my earlier post that is issued by VeriSign). The process in a nutshell is that the software provider purchases a security certificate (yearly fee to VeriSign), digitally signs their boot software, then submits it to Microsoft to create a signature that the software provider attaches to their boot software. On the surface this may not seem like a big deal, but rumor has it that Microsoft is pressuring hardware manufacturers to ensure that Secure boot cannot be disabled by the end-user...This is very concerning to me in that I should be able to boot whatever software I wish. Secondly I do not like Microsoft being my big brother and saying "yeah" or "nay" to some software given that they are the ones that issues the digital signature. The issue here is what if Microsoft decides that they do not like some other company's software and denies their boot signature and thus their boot-ability?

There is quite a lot on UEFI on the web and for those that are interested, here are some links I have been looking at:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unified...ware_Interface
http://mjg59.dreamwidth.org/
http://www.pcworld.com/article/25980...oot_plans.html

Thankfully, there is work in the community to arrive at a solution:

http://www.linuxfoundation.org/news-...em-open-source

Anyway, my apologies for the thread diversion, but I thought it has some merit given how this whole Win 8 issue will affect us all.

Cheers,

Sam

Well, thank you guys for proving that I'm not the only one who was having these worries...

Time to turn the clock back more than a decade, Microsoft needs to create two different operating systems, one consumer based, and one for professional users, remember windows 95 and Windows NT. If Microsoft carry on the path they are on, someone will step in and create a new operating system for professional use, or professional application programs will move to Unix based operating systems.

Kevin

Originally Posted by orion242

That's nice. Verisign is one of the most expensive cert issuers out there.

I thought the metrosexual interface was going to be the most annoying ‘feature’, looks like that's just the tip of the ice berg.

Does anyone know if you can upgrade the Intel Win8 based tablets to Win7.

Pretty sad when we have to use the term "upgrade" to reference a move to an earlier version. But really, we all saw this when Bill in his infinite wisdom went from XP to vista...

Windoze 8 success will prove that the general public are getting dumber. 14 year old girls on twitter and fanboys will rave about it while professionals that use computers as tools will struggle to do their job.

That's nice. Verisign is one of the most expensive cert issuers out there.

I thought the metrosexual interface was going to be the most annoying ‘feature’, looks like that's just the tip of the ice berg.

Does anyone know if you can upgrade the Intel Win8 based tablets to Win7.

Originally Posted by knottyjabe

They saw Apple making all that money from individual users and decided they wanted that market too, therefore ignoring the needs of their current market, business. Corporate greed at it's finest...

Good day,

Speaking of greed... well... this new Win 8 security model in how it treats third party drivers repackages the term "greed" into something more like a "royalty" or "license" fee forced upon the application/hardware manufacturer. You see Win 8/Microsoft now demands/enforces that all device drivers be Security Certificate signed, etc before they can be loaded. Microsoft has only one approved Security Certificate vendor... Verisign which is owned by Symantec. Microsoft offers this certificate for $99, but this is just for the first year and thereafter it is $499 per year or a little less if you buy more years upfront. To me this just looks like a yearly license or royalty fee imposed by Microsoft to any firm that develops any hardware/software for Windows... despite already paying $$$ for their developer tools, etc. There may be more additional costs too (i.e. Microsoft Certified), but I have not investigated them in their entirety. Getting caught up in all this is the large number of free or inexpensive software that is currently available that will be unusable in Win 8... If these people or firms need to pay $$$ to simple "certify" their software, I can see free/low-cost software disappearing...

Anyway, I do hope that enough high profile computer users push back on Microsoft in order to force them to make changes. Thankfully Win 7 is still around and will be for several more years and so one is not yet "forced" to migrate to Win 8 just yet...

Cheers,

Sam

They saw Apple making all that money from individual users and decided they wanted that market too, therefore ignoring the needs of their current market, business. Corporate greed at it's finest...

Originally Posted by s2sam

Good day,

Well, you may wish to starting your drinking sooner than later... I gave you brief overview of things, but in reality there is more ... You, as a user with Admin priviledge, cannot create any type files within the "Program Files" directory... All a Admin user can so is create a Folder... that is it.

That pretty much kills functionality for some programs. I know a simple setup with winscp and putty for Linux server administration you have to install putty in the program files which this would kill that. I'm sure someone will find a work around, but damn. Microsoft sure likes making everyone conform to their ways.

I think the way around this is to buy a cheaper machine and a copy of win7 then re-install...

F-R-O-W-N-E-Y F-A-C-E . . .

Originally Posted by knottyjabe

Was win8 designed with 14 yo girls in mind? How are we supposed to work with this? Some days I want to curl up with a half gallon of Sailor Jerry's...

Good day,

Well, you may wish to starting your drinking sooner than later... I gave you brief overview of things, but in reality there is more ... You, as a user with Admin priviledge, cannot create any type files within the "Program Files" directory... All a Admin user can so is create a Folder... that is it. Now, there may be a Win 8 configuration option somewhere, but I have not yet found it... maybe my rage was clouding my investigative nature ... You can, however, copy a file to the Program Files directory and when I do this, for some reason my older programs are unable to locate this file even though it is physically present. So, I am assuming that Win 8 is blocking the app from accessing the file...

The User interface is also dramatically different and for most average users, some training will be required. It is not that hard to learn, but again it is so different that most average users will be unable to figure it out on their own. There is the more familiar "desktop" view, but navigating to it is, again, not overly intuitive... as is figuring out how to close an app... etc...

For the business user, Win 8 will require a significant investment... new apps (if they can find them) and user training... for absolutely 0 productivity gain... It will be interesting to see how the business/commercial industries responds once Win 8 becomes a bit more main stream in their circles.

Cheers,

Sam

Was win8 designed with 14 yo girls in mind? How are we supposed to work with this? Some days I want to curl up with a half gallon of Sailor Jerry's...

Good day,

I cannot answer your question directly, but I can tell you that Win 8 has a lot of issues running some programs and/or using older device drivers. Win 8 has changed their security model quite substantially and as a consequence Win 8 will simply not allow some programs to operate correctly and/or prevent some device drivers from loading. In Win 7 and prior the user was given a security message (dialog) warning them of potential issues, but the user could proceed if they wished. This option has been completely removed from Win 8 and so the user is under the mercy of Win 8's decision. There is a mechanism to disable this "strict" security policy, but it is only temporary and the system will revert back after the next reboot.

Lastly, older and/or legacy programs that would run on Win 7 with XP mode are totally out of luck as their is currently no "XP Mode" add-on to Win 8. Hopefully the commercial industry will push back on Microsoft so as to "force" them to make some changes...

Anyway, like I said this is just a heads up. Ensure you test, test, and test with Win 8 before you deploy.

Cheers,

Sam

Windows 8 and Lonmaker Turbo Compatibility...

We are under, like many of you, contract to provide laptop workstations on many contract jobs. With the new win8 OS being pushed, I must ask, how will/does Lonmaker play with win8? I have done a few google searches on this and came up with nothing...