I have installed the public beta version of Windows 8 onto my main machine as a boot option in order to assess its suitability for my imaging clients.
First impressions are not good, the touch interface may work well on a tablet but as the default for a standard PC + monitor its hopeless.
The rest looks to be Windows 7 with some changes to the interface. It took me 5 minutes trying to find out how to restart the machine since all the usual desktop controls are not there any more and Microsoft are not giving the user any clues.
Clearly Microsoft wants Windows 8 to be hip but it ends up looking like an old fool, I just hope they can drag this one back from the edge as it currently looks like a slow motion car crash.
If your planning a system upgrade in the next 12 months then specify Windows 7 (preferably 64bit – give me a call if you have any queries.)
I will persevere with Windows 8 to check out Photoshop/Lightroom/Wacom/Xrite interoperability but I’m not looking forward to it.
Stephen