In-Depth with the Windows 8 Consumer Preview
by Andrew Cunningham, Ryan Smith, Kristian Vättö & Jarred Walton on March 9, 2012 10:30 AM EST- Posted in
- Microsoft
- Operating Systems
- Windows
- Windows 8
Windows Recovery Environment
The Windows Recovery Environment, or WinRE, has actually been around for awhile. It was first introduced in Windows Vista as a basic boot environment from which users could run tools like System Restore, Startup Repair, and the Command Prompt, and it could also restore a complete OS image created by Windows Backup.
This menu remained basically unchanged in Windows 7, but in Windows 8 it picks up Metro styling and also replaces the text-based menu that appears when you press F8 at Windows startup, one of the last bastions of the Windows 9x/NT era to make it into 2012 relatively unchanged.
The new graphical menu presents all of the same options as the old WinRE, as well as access to the new Refresh and Reset functionality—the main difference is that options for booting into Safe Mode are buried in the Advanced Options rather than coming up right when you press F8. When you choose a function like System Restore, the desktop-style tools included in Windows Vista and Windows 7 will pop up and walk you the rest of the way through the process. Most of the troubleshooting options require you to input the name and password for an administrator on the computer, to prevent tampering.
There’s nothing groundbreaking here, but the Metro styling is functional and attractive. See the screenshot gallery below for more.
Secure Boot and UEFI Support
After Metro, this is probably one of Windows 8's more misunderstood features, so let's try to break it down and demystify it: UEFI (Unified Extensible Firmware Interface) is a replacement for the legacy BIOS found in most PCs. UEFI support has been around in the 64-bit versions of Windows since Vista, but it has only recently started to see wider adoption in PCs. In addition to being more modern and flexible than BIOS, UEFI supports a feature called Secure Boot, which can compare signatures in drivers, OS loaders, and other things against security certificates stored in firmware to verify that your computer is using a known safe bootloader rather than a malware bootloader. On both ARM and x64 computers certified for Windows 8, Secure Boot will be enabled by default to prevent these potential exploits. Note that this is an extremely brief overview of the functionality—you can read more on the Building Windows 8 blog if you’re interested.
Now, the problem people have with this new feature is that it can potentially be used to block any non-Windows bootloader from functioning, including those used in operating systems like Linux. By default, this is true, but you’ve got an out: in all x86-based Windows systems that ship with Windows 8, you should be able to add and remove security certificates from UEFI as needed (thus adding certificates that Linux needs to be recognized as a trusted operating system) or disabling secure boot entirely (making the Windows 8 PC act more or less like most Windows 7 PCs do now).
This will be slightly different for Windows on ARM—WOA systems will also support UEFI and thus the Secure Boot feature, but users won’t be allowed to add certificates or disable the feature, and OEMs will be disallowed from shipping updates or tools that unlock the bootloader (as some Android tablet makers have been known to do). You might not like this behavior, but the fact remains that this is how the vast majority of ARM devices work today. Linux advocates act as though Microsoft has taken something away in disallowing third-party OSes on WOA devices, when in fact they’re disabling nothing that hasn’t already been disabled on most competing tablets.
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Andrew.a.cunningham - Friday, March 9, 2012 - link
..."Apples IPAD is the reason for sparking the tablet market to what it is today..."Bingo.
medi01 - Monday, March 12, 2012 - link
No bingo. Just price drop on major components. If not Apple it would have been someone else. Just less hyped. Netbook is a good instance of it.Oh, and for anyone who had intensively used pocket PCs, transition to "add a phone to it" was more then obivous too.
kmmatney - Friday, March 9, 2012 - link
Plain and simple - none of those tablets mattered. A co-worker of mine had a Toshiba "tablet" PC back in 2003, running Windows XP. It was just a laptop computer where you could flip the screen around and then you could use a stylus to jot down notes. However it was always easier just to type the notes in, so it was used as a normal laptop 99% of the time. There were very few apps that made use of the tablet capability. I just can't call this device a true tablet, like the iPad. The tablet market didn't really exists until APple put everything together into a package specifically designed for 100% tablet usage.ananduser - Friday, March 9, 2012 - link
Which unfortunately happened to be an enlarged smartphone.bji - Friday, March 9, 2012 - link
What's unfortunate about it? People love the device and its precedent (iPhone) led the way.PopinFRESH007 - Sunday, April 15, 2012 - link
I might have missed it but I don't think anyone said Apple invented tablet computers. As you noted, Apple was certainly the only one who was able to create a tablet market. Those old convertible hinge laptops that Microsoft called Tablet PC's back in the day were garbage and nothing ever happened with them. I don't even remember them lasting on the market for more than a year. Because it was another example of Microsoft cramming a point & click interface into a hand held device. Microsoft can't seem to learn that different form factors and interaction methods won't all work ok with the same UI.kevith - Friday, March 9, 2012 - link
I really like Win 8.The Metro-thing is a very good replacement for the - apparently - beloved Start Menu. Fast and versatile, with the very nice writing-instantly-invokes-search feature. The app-drawer and the "charms", in combination with keystrokes make a very powerful and very fast UI.
The desktop is almost the same, only a few things have changed, all for the better.
I liked Win 7 immidiately, the same goes for 8.
I´m excited to see the final result.
Andrew.a.cunningham - Friday, March 9, 2012 - link
It's interesting, because my initial reaction to Metro was much more negative, but after a week and a half of near-constant usage I took a liking to it. I definitely understand why people object to it, but I think too many people aren't making an honest effort to use the UI and evaluate it on its own merits/demerits.faizoff - Friday, March 9, 2012 - link
Yea very similar reaction for me as well. I didn't like it at first but now find that I'm using it a lot.emalamisura - Friday, March 9, 2012 - link
I have been using Windows 8 as my primary desktop since its release, I am a developer and I have a triple monitor setup at home and I have to say it has had the opposite effect for me. I was excited about it at first, and now I have grown to absolutely hate it and despise it. The main things for me are the primary things you mentioned, the little popup box where start menu use to be dissapears when I try to click it - gets me every time, just cant adjust to it. The charms bar is very difficult to hit, often going to other screen, when I do get it, I often scroll off of it by accident and it vanishes again. I have attempted to use the Windows key more often, but I feel like I am being forced into this situation.Most of the time I avoid using Metro as much as possible, its actually quite useless to me, I go into it and pin as many applications to my task bar as possible so I can avoid going into it at all to launch something. The wierd way that the Desktop shows on my left and right monitors and metro in my primary, and when I try to keep metro up and use a Desktop app it vanishes to an empty desktop is just very wierd to me and not helpful at all! I at least wish I could snap Metro apps onto my other monitors, make it more useful to me...
Microsoft claims "Desktop is just another app", its a bold statement that falls short at every turn. You get dropped into Desktop for doing anything remotely technical, want to change monitor configuration Desktop, want to browse a drive Desktop...etc.
Whats funny is I love Metro by itself, I love all the changes they have done to desktop as well. But when you combine these two things that have no business being together you get this Frankenstain amalgamation that just simply doesn't work, and I don't see how it will ever work! Maybe they can prove me wrong, I hope they do...