Faiblesse Des Sens Posted May 4, 2012 Report Share Posted May 4, 2012 ^Windows doesn't have blu-ray support currently, so it's already like that a bit. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
fuchikoma Posted May 4, 2012 Report Share Posted May 4, 2012 By "like that" do you mean locking out the ability to read the discs? It's more like the lack of DVD playback they're discussing, but not quite since it's not removing a feature that used to be there. You could get a BD drive for a Windows PC and read discs/play movies for about as long as they've existed. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Faiblesse Des Sens Posted May 4, 2012 Report Share Posted May 4, 2012 ^But not because of windows. The drive has to come with software that allows playback. As in: Someone has to foot the bill for playback, and it's not MS. Throughout the various websites I saw, I read a few comments about people selling laptops and stuff with blu-ray drives then people complained that they couldn't playback the movies. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
fuchikoma Posted May 4, 2012 Report Share Posted May 4, 2012 No, there's nothing that lets it play them straight "out of the box." As I understand it, you can still read the disc, but like DVDs, there's not any built-in player that can handle the decryption, demuxing, etc. (The actual codecs I think are actually quite accessible since they are the same ones used for most video now...) There's also a whole heap of headaches caused by HDCP protection - so you might have a 1080p monitor or better, and a 1080p Blu-Ray, but your video card and/or monitor isn't fully HDCP compliant, so you're limited to... 1080i (? or 720p?) or maybe just get a playback error. The joys of DRM... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
fuchikoma Posted May 6, 2012 Report Share Posted May 6, 2012 This is old news, but I didn't see it in here - In Windows 8, according to plan, MS will be able to revoke your apps remotely if they see the need. I'm very uncool with this on a desktop computer, and while I bet it'll be stoppable by simply disabling a service (if administrator privileges are sufficient to do so!) being able to hack your way around a restriction doesn't make the restriction ok. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Faiblesse Des Sens Posted May 7, 2012 Report Share Posted May 7, 2012 Apple's had the ability but IIRC has never used it. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
fuchikoma Posted May 7, 2012 Report Share Posted May 7, 2012 It's been speculated there is one in the iPhone, but not the desktop OS. Google has used one to remove malware from Android devices and Amazon has used one to pull purchased books with questionable licensing from Kindles, but so far it's not been an option on desktops that I know of. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Baconrath Posted May 7, 2012 Report Share Posted May 7, 2012 By my logic Windows 8 and whatever they market as "Windows 9" will never be as good as Windows 7 because...7 8 9. hyuck hyuck hyuck bad joke Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
deanb Posted May 11, 2012 Author Report Share Posted May 11, 2012 http://news.cnet.com/8301-1001_3-57431236-92/microsoft-bans-firefox-on-arm-based-windows-mozilla-says/ Well the ARM version of Windows 8 might have just closed itself off from the EU market. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TheMightyEthan Posted May 11, 2012 Report Share Posted May 11, 2012 Apparently Apple does something similar on iOS and gets away with it in the EU. Just from the way MS's actions are described in the article though it doesn't even seem like that would fly in the US. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
fuchikoma Posted May 11, 2012 Report Share Posted May 11, 2012 There was once concern over Apple disallowing apps that redundantly copied functionality that was bundled with iOS, but they allow other browsers like Opera, Skyfire or Ghostery. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Johnny Posted May 11, 2012 Report Share Posted May 11, 2012 Wait, isn't the browser battle specifically what Microsoft lost a huge law battle over years back when it was decided that their business practices were bad for free market competition? Going down this road again after already being burned for it seems like a fucking stupid move. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TheMightyEthan Posted May 11, 2012 Report Share Posted May 11, 2012 Well if you actually read the article, MS isn't straight-up banning Mozilla. They're allowed to make a browser, MS just won't give them access to all the same APIs they use, and it can only run in Metro mode, not classic. Tangentially, I don't understand why MS cares. They don't charge for their browser, their browser doesn't display ads directly... What do they gain from people using IE? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Johnny Posted May 11, 2012 Report Share Posted May 11, 2012 IE's default search is (iirc) Bing, but that's the only thing I can think of. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
deanb Posted May 11, 2012 Author Report Share Posted May 11, 2012 Apparently Apple does something similar on iOS and gets away with it in the EU. Just from the way MS's actions are described in the article though it doesn't even seem like that would fly in the US. iOS doesn't have a majority of computer sales though. That's the whole point. Windows is a monopoly. That's why in Europe you get: http://www.browserchoice.eu/BrowserChoice/browserchoice_en.htm Upon instillation of Windows 7 (and I think Vista. XP is too old now) (nope it's XP too) MS using undocumented API's is what has gotten them in deep shit tons of times before as it's anti-competitive. MS would be using fancy bits of the OS therefore giving their products an advantage over others. It's like they've completely forgotten a decade of legal battles(that they've consistently lost), something must be up. Metro is a fairly limited environment, built primarily for web-style apps and widgets. Firefox isn't really a widget or a web-app. It's a web browser, which is used to run and display other web-apps. It's also perfectly capable of running in Windows and on ARM, but MS have put up barriers in that front. Yes Mozilla and Google, Opera, Apple etc could rebuild their browsers for use in Metro, but it's probably not going to work well at all given they'd essentially be running a browser in a browser. That's more than likely why MS have IE running in "classic" mode (aka old fashioned Windows, like IE of always), cos other wise it'd be running like shit and be missing a ton of features (it already doesn't run flash). Firefox n Chrome are both funded/created by Google too, which is heavily encroaching on Microsofts market share in tons of areas; Mobile, web, office etc.So there's that reason for blocking off the other browsers. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Faiblesse Des Sens Posted May 11, 2012 Report Share Posted May 11, 2012 Booted up Windows 8 again today. You know how everyone bitches about no start menu button? It's a hot corner now. Why has no one mentioned this? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
deanb Posted May 11, 2012 Author Report Share Posted May 11, 2012 See my edit here. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Faiblesse Des Sens Posted May 12, 2012 Report Share Posted May 12, 2012 Bottom left is what I'm talking about. The bottom/top right hot corner is more than a start menu. Bottom left is start (metro), and top left are your metro apps. I hope someone tweaks that one to be able to be your non-metro apps. Anyways, I've been using it all day. I'm not sure my productivy was all that much lower as I wasn't doing a lot of window switching and once I figured out what to do/not to do with Metro... well it felt just like Win 7. The smoothness the UI has now makes it quite pleasant to use. Ditto for the explorer ribbon. No more digging through menus! I haven't tried out that app that gives you a traditional start menu and I haven't really felt the need to. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TheMightyEthan Posted May 12, 2012 Report Share Posted May 12, 2012 Apparently Apple does something similar on iOS and gets away with it in the EU. Just from the way MS's actions are described in the article though it doesn't even seem like that would fly in the US. iOS doesn't have a majority of computer sales though. That's the whole point. Windows is a monopoly. Windows isn't anywhere close to a monopoly in the mobile market, Apple has a much stronger position there, and this whole issue is about the mobile market. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
deanb Posted May 12, 2012 Author Report Share Posted May 12, 2012 Windows 8, not Windows Phone 8 (which is yet to be officially announced afaik) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TheMightyEthan Posted May 12, 2012 Report Share Posted May 12, 2012 Windows 8 on ARM-based devices. When was the last time you saw a desktop running on ARM? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
deanb Posted May 12, 2012 Author Report Share Posted May 12, 2012 When was the last time you saw a mobile running Windows? Also ARM isn't "Only works in mobiles". It's been supported by Linux & Co for yonks. It's only big news with Windows cos Windows has a fair chunk of the OS space and up to now had been exclusive to X86. (Windows CE and Windows Mobil/Phone already supported it) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TheMightyEthan Posted May 12, 2012 Report Share Posted May 12, 2012 I know it's not just for mobiles, but in the current environment that's basically what it amounts to. Phones, tablets, game handhelds, etc. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
deanb Posted May 12, 2012 Author Report Share Posted May 12, 2012 It isn't for mobile phones AT ALL. Microsoft have their Windows Phone 7 OS for mobiles, Windows CE for embedded devices like consoles/handhelds. iOS is the weird on in taking an embedded OS built for MP3 players and blowing it up to fit on a bigger screen. Before then OSes were scaled down to tablets. Which is pretty much exactly what MS are continuing doing. Apple(and Google) are the ones that take a mobile operating system and put it on tablets, not MS. When MS make a tablet operating system it's built off the same one(usually with a couple tweaks like simpler in-screen keyboard) they put on big bulky desktops. That's how daddy did it, that's how america does it, and it's worked out pretty well so far. Just what it means now with Win 8 is not only can manufacturers make Windows tablets on Intel/AMD X86 chips like the past decade, they can now build them on ARM chips too. They can build laptops and desktops with an ARM processor too. Most likely won't be, it'll mainly be maybe a few netbooks and some HTPCs(some HTPCs are Linux running on ARM already). Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
deanb Posted May 14, 2012 Author Report Share Posted May 14, 2012 http://www.pcpro.co....s-of-windows-8/ A round-up of the "best new features of Win 8" http://www.pcpro.co....ee-in-windows-8 And a "What it's missing" post. 1 and 10 are two I'd hope will be resolved. The rest would be nice, the Font Manager thing especially(though I don't mess with fonts as much as I used to) Oh yeah does anyone know what Win 8 is like on a dual-screen? Win 7 is real nice but what I've seen of Win 8 suggests it might not play well. I could install Win 8 and try out but I'm not up for that level of commitment. edit: I could always Google (This is Developer) What an odd layout. (This is consumer) http://www.geek.com/articles/chips/five-days-with-the-windows-8-consumer-preview-on-a-dual-screen-desktop-2012035/ Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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