Crazy Question: Can you Roll Back to Windows 7?

[Talldog]

I wish! Win 8 makes Vista seem like the perfect OS. It's horrible!

I guess beauty is in the eye of the beholder. After 5 weeks with our Surface Pros, my wife and I were happy enough with Win8 that I upgraded our non-touch Windows 7 HPE-150t desktop. We've had Win8 running on it for 2 weeks now and we're completely satisfied. As an added bonus, having Win8 on a non-touch computer forced us to learn all the mouse and keyboard shortcuts.

I'm not ashamed to say it: I LIKE METRO! It's certainly not perfect, but over time it's just going to get better.

 

[Inadorel]

My experience is that Win7 and Win8 are broadly cross-compatible as far as drivers are concerned. I upgraded an Iconia W500 which was designed for Win7 to 8 last year - and all the drivers worked, including the fancy stuff around screen rotation etc. I then had to downgrade it back to 7 (only to get support because the screen failed and Win 8 was still in Beta at the time) and had no problems at all. Surface may be different for stuff like the keyboard - but I kind of suspect not. Having said that - I'd strongly advise against putting Win 7 on the Surface. Win 7 was a horrible, horrible experience on a tablet - I literally cannot imagine hating Win 8 enough to go through the pain of trying to do that.

 

[kristalsoldier]

I guess beauty is in the eye of the beholder. After 5 weeks with our Surface Pros, my wife and I were happy enough with Win8 that I upgraded our non-touch Windows 7 HPE-150t desktop. We've had Win8 running on it for 2 weeks now and we're completely satisfied. As an added bonus, having Win8 on a non-touch computer forced us to learn all the mouse and keyboard shortcuts.

I'm not ashamed to say it: I LIKE METRO! It's certainly not perfect, but over time it's just going to get better.

Yup...me too! I also got my RT first...which was also my first experience with Win 8 (to the extent that it is). Liked it and took the plunge and upgraded from Win 7 Pro.

 

[JohnF]

I wish! Win 8 makes Vista seem like the perfect OS. It's horrible!

Other than the start button, what is so different between the desktop mode in Windows 8 from Windows 7? If I never went to the Metro start page I'm not sure I could tell the difference (again, other than the start button which Start8 pretty well handles). What makes it so horrible?

I'm not trying to start an argument or anything I'm just trying to understand what people don't like about it. I've been using Windows 8 since the consumer preview came out last June and thought the transition from Windows 7 was pretty seamless. I never really used the metro interface until I got the Surface Pro then started to understand what makes it so nice. Before that I didn't really see that it was much different of an experience from Windows 7.

 

[bertopl]

I know there's some compatibility issues for now with windows 8 desktop mode. one thing I wanted to do on mine was run an older version of autocad which installed and ran just fine on W7. I was disappointed to discover that the installer chokes on W8. I think theyre barely certifying the newer version of autocad for W8 but it's still hit or miss whether it works for some people.

 

[mitchellvii]

One issue is that some legacy software gets slightly borked under Windows 8. Access 2003 (last time MS got it right) works but have issues and gets crashy. The reason you can't install Windows 7 is because the BIOS blocks it and you can't change the BIOS setting that blocks it because the BIOS doesn't list it. You can install Windows 7 pretty easily using a VM and it works fine. Google Surface Pro Windows 7 VM.

 

[HD_Dude]

The reason you can't install Windows 7 is because the BIOS blocks it and you can't change the BIOS setting that blocks it because the BIOS doesn't list it. You can install Windows 7 pretty easily using a VM and it works fine. Google Surface Pro Windows 7 VM.

Hey everybody - THANKS for the replies.

Seems to me it's possible, but it appears to have a few hurdles that may be beyond my level of expertise.

So here's a follow-up: Is there any way to hide the start screen with the tiles on it - and start right up with the Desktop? Or alternatively, if I do the Win7 VM, can that appear as my start-up screen?

Again, thanks.

 

[kristalsoldier]

Why don't you just log in as usual and as soon as the Start Screen comes up, hit the tile for the desktop and stay there instead of jumping through all these hoops...just saying...

 

[Russ]

Is there any way to hide the start screen with the tiles on it - and start right up with the Desktop?

HD_Dude --

I run Stardock Start8 ($4.99) on my Win8 machines.

Start8? for Windows® 8 - Bringing back the Windows Start menu

That allows me to bypass the Start screen and boot directly to the desktop. I do that on a couple of my machines, but on the Pro I boot to the Start screen. There are similar utilities out there that do the same. I just happened to find this one first, and like it.

Regards,
Russ

 

[Russ]

Why don't you just log in as usual and as soon as the Start Screen comes up, hit the tile for the desktop . . .

KristalSoldier --

For me, it's location of the mouse/keyboard and instant information. For example, my shop computer often has the mouse and keyboard pushed aside in favor of something I'm working on, and I usually want to know right away if my DSL is online. (My DSL is erratic back here in the woods.) A quick glance at the icon tray tells me that, so I can or not proceed to use it, depending on whether I need the DSL for whatever I wanted to do.

Take care,
Russ

 

[kristalsoldier]

KristalSoldier --

For me, it's location of the mouse/keyboard and instant information. For example, my shop computer often has the mouse and keyboard pushed aside in favor of something I'm working on, and I usually want to know right away if my DSL is online. (My DSL is erratic back here in the woods.) A quick glance at the icon tray tells me that, so I can or not proceed to use it, depending on whether I need the DSL for whatever I wanted to do.

Take care,
Russ

Oh...I see. Yes, I can understand that. This is one thing that I have a problem with the Win 8 interface as such. While it shows the name of the account and associated pic on the Start screen, there is no Clock, Date and day notification and connectivity info, which I find irritating. I do hope MS can fix this. To expect to download and run an app just for this makes little sense!!!!

 

[HD_Dude]

Thanks again.

I know it sounds like I'm an unhappy camper. But I'm really not. I love the SP. Great piece of gear. And for me, it's been solid, reliable and flawless. That also goes for Windows 8. It works exactly as it should. No problems at all.

I'm just very interested in all this, and want to figure out what can be done, and what cannot be done, and why. What our options are, and how to make them happen if we ever wanted to pursue them. That's all.

And I appreciate all the good suggestions.