Wednesday 8 May 2013

WINDOWS 8 REVIEW

Wednesday 8 May 2013
Microsoft has long dominated the desktop and laptop markets with its Windows operating system, but things have started to change; Apple has started to gain market share with its Macs, while tablets, led by the iPad, have started to eat into the traditional PC’s dominance. It’s clear, then, that Microsoft has to change to keep up and that’s where Windows 8 comes in: it's an OS designed for traditional desktops and tablets alike.

Windows 8 Start screen

Windows 8 now has two interfaces. So, as well as the Desktop view that we’ve all come to know and love, there's also the Metro interface, with its Live Tiles.

As the name implies, the Start Screen replaces the old Start menu. It’s more than just a program launcher: as well as plain shortcuts, the screen can house Live Tiles, which update to show you live information, such as how many unread emails you have or what the weather is like. Live Tiles are a great way to keep up with what’s going on and having all this information on a single page is very useful and a vast improvement on the old Gadgets in Windows Vista and 7.
The Start Screen is beautifully smooth to navigate. With its large icons, it certainly looks like it’s designed for tablets, and it has some touchscreen-ready features. On a touchscreen device, you can swipe to move between Start's multiple screens, drag-and-drop tiles where you want them and pinch-to-zoom to get an overall view of your Start Screen. Fortunately, Microsoft has remembered desktop users and you can use a mouse’s scroll-wheel or the scroll bar to move left and right through the pages.

Windows 8 system requirements

You need a 1GHz or faster CPU (it also needs to support PAE or PAE-NX Physical Address Extension for new security features in the Windows 8 kernel), 1GB of RAM (or 2GB for 64-bit systems), 20GB of hard drive space and a DirectX 9 graphics card with WDDM driver.

Features new to Windows 8

Shell and user interface
Windows 8 features an extensively redesigned user interface incorporating a design language codenamed "Metro", optimized for touchscreens. A new "Start screen", similar to the one in Windows Phone, includes live application tiles. The start screen replaces the Start menu, being triggered by the Windows key, clicking a hot corner in bottom left (replacing the Start button), and is also the first screen shown on startup. The user can go to the regular desktop via a tile on the Start screen, or by launching a desktop application.

User login
Windows 8 features a new lock screen, which includes a date and time display, along with the ability to display notifications from apps. Two new login methods optimized for touch screens are also available, including a four-digit PIN, or a "picture password"; which users allow the use of certain gestures performed on a selected picture to login. These gestures will take into account the shape, the start and end points, as well as the direction

Multi-monitor support
Windows 8 also includes improved support for multi-monitor configurations; the taskbar can now be shown on multiple displays, and each display can also show its own dedicated taskbar. Wallpapers can also be spanned across multiple displays, or each display can have its own separate wallpaper.

Networking
Windows 8 incorporates improved support for mobile broadband as a "first-class" method of internet connectivity. Upon the insertion of a SIM card, the operating system will automatically determine the user's carrier and configure relevant connection settings using an Access Point Name database. The operating system can also monitor mobile data usage, and changes its behavior accordingly to reduce bandwidth use on metered networks.

Security
Windows 8 ships with an updated version of Windows Defender. Now based on Microsoft Security Essentials, it adds virus protection capabilities to the software alongside malware protection. Windows Defender will automatically disable itself if it detects that third-party security software has been installed, and is designed to only remain active if no antivirus software is currently installed, or it detects that an antivirus program's subscription has expired.

Windows 8 Product key





1 comment:

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