Windows Gr8: How Microsoft finally released a geek worthy OS

If you've ever spent some time geeking out with me to technology you have clearly heard a few points repeated ad nauseum.

Apple is the devil itself and I truly feel they are in a position to be the living embodiment of George Orwell's big brother.

"Think Group"

Microsoft, for its part, is only slightly better.  For years the software giant has been releasing the same buggy code base with a new coat of paint.  Their business model consists of forcing users into a perpetual upgrade cycle for "features" they don't need.  All the while, their software remains buggy, inconsistent, and with a tendency to crash right when you need it most.

"Perhaps now, Master Bruce, we try Linux?"

On the geeker side of the OS divide, we have Linux.  Faster, more stable, better support for older hardware, and- oh yeah- completely free.  Not to mention open source.  It's truly an OS owned by the people, and while several corporations support it, no one person or entity OWNS it.

While that may sound like geek speak right now, it has large scale implementations for our future.  As our technological devices become our primary source of information AND communication, who do you want controlling that data?  The community, or a billion dollar software giant with its own business and political agendas?

My first flirting with Linux began in 2005.  I was a heavy Windows advocate when- while writing a final paper for a political science class- Windows XP crashed, and wouldn't return.  At this point, reinstalling XP had become a three month occurrence.  Resigned to losing my paper, I put in the install disk.  It had a very minor scratch- no doubt due to the disk having to be used so much- and windows refused to install.

When I called Microsoft for help, they offered to ship me a new disk.  For $40.  They were charging me to fix their broken product.  My hands tied, I payed- what was for a college student living on ramen noodles an exuberant sum- but made a pact with myself right then and there, I was going to "learn Linux."

Microsoft Support:  "Try imitation Ramen.
9 out of 10 starving college students can't tell the difference."

I still kept windows around in a dual-boot environment, but I only upgraded when I got a free copy with a new pc, and 95% of my time was spent in Linux.  More and more, Windows was becoming a place I went to, begrudgingly, when I wanted to retro-game.

It continued to crash on me constantly.  I continued to spend more time fixing it then using it.  I ran back to Debian every chance I got.

Then something changed.  Windows 8 happened.  Windows 8, and it's newest incarnation, Windows 8.1, is pretty fantastic.

"Oh NO HE DIDN'T!"

Okay, I can already see the pitchforks and hear the moans.  The new, full screen Metro UI is a mess. Navigation is frustrating at best.  Multi-tasking is nearly impossible.  The simple act of finding the program you want to open requires a search bar.

With Metro, Microsoft attempted to unify desktops, tablets, and phones under a single interface.  This is an example of Microsoft being a poor historian.  Other companies have attempted this with disastrous results that managed to not only fail to catch on with the general public, but isolate their own communities in the process.

The situation is so bad that users are paying for the "privilege" to downgrade to Windows 7. 

It turns out that users don't want a single UI that functions as a half-baked attempt to unify different devices with unique usage case scenarios.  We seem pretty content to have fully functional navigational systems that leverage the strengths and minimize the weaknesses of a particular platform.

Whoda thunk?

Great, but not a desktop.

The good news- and what Microsoft isn't telling you- is this problem is incredibly easy to fix.

The link above is to a free program called "Classic Shell."  Install that, and in minutes you'll be booting into a Windows 7 like screen.  Even better, Classic Shell is configurable.  Prefer Vista?  Click a button, Classic Shell will do that.  XP?  Classic Shell.  Want some Frankenstein combination of the above?  Classic Shell's advanced options will make it happen.

In short, it doesn't just return Windows to its roots, it manages to improve upon them.

Here's an approximation of what my Windows 8 desktop looks like.

No ones going to love Windows 8 just because they can fix it.  The truth is, Windows 8 is incredibly stable. Software rarely crashes, and when it does, it's almost always because I'm using either legacy (OLD) or beta, experimental software.

More importantly, and something I've loved about Linux- when software does crash, the software itself crashes.  Rouge code had a tendency to take the whole OS down with it on previous versions of Windows.  Not anymore.  My computer can stay up and running even if "Nestopia" is having a bad day.

Windows 8 is fast.  You can boot up in under forty-five seconds.  If you have a machine with a UEFI bios, you can shave that time down to under ten seconds.

Adding new devices and drivers is as simple as plugging a device in, and when I do have to go the third party route the process goes seamlessly, without need of troubleshooting endless blue-screens-of-death.

If you're a gamer, there's never been a better time to own a WinPC.  Steam and Amazon compete during frequent sales, bringing titles that often cost $60 on consoles down to under $5.  If you want to use a gamepad, the OS- and virtually all new games- have built in support for the XBOX gamepads, both 360 and One.  Want to use a PS4 controller?  Free software makes that simple.  Meanwhile, the games are significantly graphically enhanced compared to their console counterparts.

On the other side of the divide, certain aspects of Linux are a mess.  Linux has gotten better at detecting your devices without incident- most hardware is plug and play.  However, because there's no unifed interface for driver management, if you do have a device not supported "out of the box" be prepared to spend several hours hacking up your system via command line.

I find myself now spending about 50% of my time in Windows.  I still prefer Linux by default, but once I'm in Windows, I feel less compelled to leave.

My arguments for switching users to Linux- something I have done successfully dozen of times- used to fall into three categories.  Technological (less crash prone, more secure), Practical (saves you time, money), and Political (Control your own information, open-source benefits).

Technologically, Windows is catching up.  While security remains an issue, Windows 8 simply does not crash very often.

Practically, Linux is free, but as the above example of driver management demonstrates, at this point, Windows will save you time.

More and more my arguments for Linux are coming down to political views, not merits for the OS itself.

Note to Linux developers, relevant as those arguments may be, users don't care.

If they did, they wouldn't be buying iPhones.

More often than ever, when average users ask me which OS I recommend to "just use" I'm saying Windows. While cringing- and feeling more than a little defeated.

Your move, Linux.