Windows 8 – Bad News For Musicians?

Microsoft is planning radical changes for the next major version of Windows, Windows 8.

Microsoft is responding to pressure from Apple’s success with the iPad with a new version of Windows that promises to provide a unified look, across both tablets and desktop computers.

Cool idea – but can Microsoft deliver on that promise? And can it jumpstart the development of music apps like iOS?

We’re tri-platform here, so we’ve been following WIndows 8 with interest. And among Synthopia’s regular readers, the Mac & Windows platforms are neck and neck, distantly followed by iPad, iPhone and Android. So we expect that Windows 8 may be an important upgrade for a lot of readers, too

One of the most interesting discussions we’ve seen on Windows 8 is a new article by MobileOpportunity’s Michael Mace. He has been digging into into the Windows 8 consumer preview and offers a skeptical take:

The most important message I want you to understand is this: Windows 8 is not Windows.

Although Microsoft calls it Windows, and a lot of Windows code may still be present under the hood, Windows 8 is a completely new operating system in every way that matters to users.  It looks different, it works differently, and it forces you to re-learn much of what you know today about computers.

From a user perspective, Microsoft Windows is being killed this fall and replaced by an entirely new OS that has a Windows 7 emulator tacked onto it.

Mace put together a screencast that covers some of his concerns with WIndows 8:

Microsoft deserves credit for being bold with Windows 8 – and Windows 8’s ‘Metro’ UI looks like it could be an interesting tablet interface.

But desktop users are going to have some serious work to do in order to get comfortable with the UI changes. And many of the UI changes seem to complicate things for power users like electronic musicians.

We’ll know a lot more about the implications of Windows 8 this fall. And even then, though, as with Apple’s OS X Lion, musicians probably should not be among first adopters.

What do you think of what you’ve seen so far of Windows 8? And what do you think its impact will be for electronic musicians?

73 thoughts on “Windows 8 – Bad News For Musicians?”

  1. Musicians using Windows as OS are *NOT* using Windows, but music software.

    As far as there is still a way to add audio card, use Asio drivers and install a DAW, I just dont care about the OS look-n-feel.

    The major benefit : the OS is touch-orientated from the beggining, so the DAW will probably take benefit as well …

  2. Haha this guy is a joker.

    Maybe if musicians are completly computer illiterate then maybe this will be the case.

    Cakewalk has already come out stating that W8 actually improves performance; the W8 desktop works exactly the same as W7, yes the start menu is gone… replaced with the start screen. Spend a few days with W8 and you will find that the logic workflow is actually much better!

  3. I’ve been following the comments made by Cakewalk since Sonar is my flagship host. They’ve stated that Windows 8 is even more efficient and stable than Windows 7, with a more balanced core load among the processors in the cpu, and that programs are more stable at incredibly low latencies. The layer for the Metro UI can be switched off, and you’re left with a basic operating system.

  4. There have been many rumors about Microsoft dropping MIDI support (though that later turned out to apply only to the ARM version) and so on. Apple certainly made a clever move by adding realtime audio and midi capabilities to iOS, so Microsoft should learn from it. On the other hand, we have to face it, the big bucks are being made with iFat Apps, and I’m afraid Microsoft just wants Windows to become the next iPad ecosystem, with stripped down applications and limited access to the OS. So while iOS is slowly getting a bit more usable for music, Windows might be thrown back to where iOS was at the beginning. The problem is, nobody really cared if iOS apps were limited, it was all new and you didn’t expect to run your DAW on it.
    On the good side: you don’t need to upgrade, and if everything fails you can still buy a Mac… as long as that works at least.

  5. Lots of UI scare mongering there. I’m not convinced someone with any experience with modern tech is going to be unable to figure out dragging the screen up to unlock, or is going to miss the clearly labelled “control panel” button he could have just clicked on.

    Assuming there’s a traditional UI option and reasonable backwards software/driver compatibility, I’m reserving judgement. There was a similar uproar over XP.

    1. >There was a similar uproar over XP

      MS lovers and haters ALWAYS says the NEW version is radically wildly different from the last version and either the world’s going to end or become heaven and then the new version comes out and it is almost exactly the same as the last version.

      I don’t know about Windows 7, but in fully updated Vista, if you run the memory check utility, it looks like your running under DOS. “New” Microsoft code always looks like stuff that has been hanging around since before World War 2.

      1. “New” Microsoft code always looks like stuff that has been hanging around since before World War 2.

        Not sure if that’s good or bad!

        lol

    1. Thanks for that thread link Mark.
      There is a frankly astonishing reply from a Microsoft dev (James Dailey) with regard to the Tablet OS but to me hints at their overall lack of focus in general for Pro Audio users.

      In part he says: “I would love to have MIDI available for Windows 8 Metro style apps since I am an electronic musician as well as an engineer (http://www.jamesdailey.com/Music.aspx). I just want to be completely honest and say that MIDI really isn’t on the radar at this time. The reality is that we are focusing on high quality low latency audio in Windows 8 to support the trend toward VOIP. ”

      The rest of his reply isn’t much better.

  7. Given how bad music software UI design is, and how bad Windows has traditionally been, then it’s not going to make a blind bit of difference. Would be nice if they put a decent audio API in like OSX, kind of gave audio software the same treatment that DirectX gave gaming software.

  8. I’m more bothered about vst compatibility which there hasn’t been much mention off, there are still loads that haven’t been updated to 64bit, for me another OS so soon will only serve to fragment the already problematic windows platform further if the vsti’s need porting, i see people moving to OSX, i have already considered it.

    1. well that’s a cross platform problem, and yes that’s something that need to be talked about. You won’t find it easier on OSX where you also have the AU format to add fragmentation to the landscape. (fortunately directX plugins on Windows have almost disappeared)

  9. I use right now Traktor, Ableton and Reason + Emulator Modular under windows 8.
    The article is written in a rather irresponsible, especially when it says that Windows 8 is not windows.
    I am an avid follower of your site, and is the first time I criticize an item, as I believe, really surprised me.
    Guys be careful before drop a bomb like this.
    In my opinion windows 8 is the best OS in the history of MS, specially about performance, is incredible faster an stable, and what i use is a beta!
    I think ARM version of windows is a fail, specially due the new incoming ultralow power CPUs coming form INTEL, in just less of 12 months will be possible use tablets, can easy reach more than 10 hours of usage with all power of x86 plataform.
    The major advantage of ARM plataform is the lower power usage, Intel is working faster for take more efficient their CPUS, at the end of road, x86 plataform.
    The bad point of windows 8 ARM, is all software you run at this moment on windows need be recoded to ARM plataform………….
    MOVE windows to ARM, is really bad move from my point of view, the only advanatge is the battery life of tablets, a thing just start change in the right mometn windows 8 be launched with the new generation of Intel CPUs!
    The history is repeating again……..i remember some thig called RISC from IBM……. : ) , somebody remember that?
    Finally windows 8, is windows…………….

    Bets regards.

    1. Whether it’s Intel or ARM, Metro is the new interface for touch screen tablets. It’s been built to conserve CPU (allows very limited background tasks from apps) so will be battery friendly. All software has to recoded (but most won’t be) for Metro as it is a new Windows run time. If only the WinRT API’s are used the software be be cross platform on both Intel and ARM. The advantage for ARM devices is that the CPU’s are much cheaper than Intel, the licensing will be cheaper as it’s not a full version of Windows 8 and they will come with Office loaded on them. So they should compete with the iPad.

    2. It seems like I’m hearing two things. The Metro interface is sort of a mess and is going to muck things up for experienced Windows users – but when you switch over to the Explorer view, everything runs better than ever.

      Can you set it to boot right into Explorer view and skip the Metro side? And are any cool features on the ‘Windows’ side of things?

      1. Actually you cannot… you can TEMPORARILY flash to a desktop.. but 98% of the functionality of the old interface is gone..

        you can use a very gutted control panel and see what appears to be a W7 desktop but the very second you press alt tab or start you are forced to use the new crap..

        This might be great on a tablet.. but for a desktop OS.. forget it..
        it’s fast.. it’s clunky..and it’s garbage..

        there are some nifty things in it.. but in almost EVERY aspect it is a huge clunky mess.
        not well thought out at all.

        sure the Facebook generation may love it.. but for anyone trying to actually work and get crap done its a steaming pile of bantha fodder..

  10. This guy is just a curmudgeon that dislikes that he has to do things a little differently. When things change people automatically think they’re UI / Design experts. It’s hard to tell how audio will be on Windows 8, but I think it’s good that Microsoft is taking more risks with its OS design.

  11. Windows 8 represents some fundamental changes in the software architecture, and will be extremely disruptive to transitioning users. This will make the Vista launch look like a cakewalk. I’m sure given time it will smooth out, like all windows updates, but this one is a doozy, and it remains to be seen how much core functionality remains or is damaged in Windows 8 at launch. I would recommend all windows users pretend that windows 8 doesn’t exist for at least a year, if ever.

    1 – No existing windows app will run on the mobile versions. None. It will require entirely new apps. Many people are making this mistake.
    2 – Software design for a mouse and keyboard cannot be easily emulated with taps. It requires re-architecting the user interface. So straight ports are out of the question. Sure, many companies will try, but the user experience will suck.
    3 – The Metro interface isn’t functional. It’s shallow and wide, and very limiting. When Metro was rolled out on the Xbox 360 it turned many simple 3 click tasks into tasks that can take 10 to 15 clicks! Content is buried several screens deep, users have no idea if a “box” launches an app, plays a movie, downloads a file, etc, and massive amounts of screen real estate are wasted. Really confusing and limited interface.
    4 – Metro on Xbox is riddle with adds. in fact, it is designed specifically around delivering adds, not for user functionality. Expect tons of adds on your windows 8 devices.
    5 – You can turn off the metro interface on desktops, and I expect almost every single user will. But it never really goes away. There are some fundamental shifts in the UI, so you can’t just “turn it off” and have “windows”. Metro has some curb appeal, but when you actually use it when trying to accomplish any reasonable task, you learn how flimsy and limited it’s usability really is. Grids of boxes are a poor way to interact with all your data.
    6 – Plan on nearly all your applications breaking. You will need to wait for updates (and pay for them). This will be a rougher transition than Vista. I also expect windows 8 to be less successful than Vista, and that’s saying a lot.

    1. Not sure if your #1 comment is correct.

      My understanding is that tablets based on Intel will run traditional Windows apps. Tablets based on ARM won’t run traditional Windows apps.

      That seems like it’s going to create a lot of confusion with customers, though, since they’ll look the same and both be called Windows.

      1. Assuming an intel tablet, refer to my points #2 and #3. Then factor in that an intel tablet will cost more, be heavier, be hotter, and have significantly worse battery life than any other competing tablet. It’s a beast that won’t exist for long.

  12. not to cover myself in paraffin while holding a lit match or anything, but – and i’ve said this before – who cares? most people who actually make their living from music use macs. this is a fact and unlikely to change any time soon. the reasons for this go way beyond “ooh, shiny aluminium” and probably have a lot to do with approximately two decades of windows being unusable for music in a professional environment (i.e. one where not being shit and crashing all the time is important, and time is a great deal of money). xp was just about usable (briefly), and windows 7 is actually pretty great for music and audio as it goes, but we have long memories. in the meantime, microsoft have to catch up with the already pretty amazing iOS music app ecosystem, and a desktop OS that is as close to bulletproof for audio as anyone has yet created.

      1. Gee, ever heard of … Logic Pro? Try to get out of your mom’s basement once in a while, kid. And for those who think Apple isn’t going to update Logic why did they just acquire Redmatica?

        1. For what it’s worth (nothing.your point has no relevance to my argument) the app makers make a shit ton of money out of hobbyists on windows so yes, of course they make windows versions. What I said was that people who make their living from music use macs. Which remains true.

        2. I am a very pleased Logic user and a near-ecstatic Autosampler user, so news of the Redmatica acquisition is gratifying. Its a good pairing between 2 companies who give good customer service. The latter has rescued my fading old hardware synths beautifully, with patches saved in fine detail. Autosampler can’t capture every single nuance of every sound, so there can be minor translation artifacts with a few, but IMO, it takes it about 95% of the way. Sweet. My EXS24 library has hit 6.7 gigabytes and I now want for nothing, sonically. A little Gear Lust, sure, ahem, but no NEED. Damn, now I have to live up to having 3000 patches there, plus 4 Alchemy Player libraries. YIKES! Thinking back to how I drew my giant dream-synth rigs in notebooks, during Wakeman’s 70s heyday, what I have now is utter sci-fi.

          1. “Thinking back to how I drew my giant dream-synth rigs in notebooks, during Wakeman’s 70s heyday, what I have now is utter sci-fi.”

            Ha – I remember sketching my ultimate modular synth over and over. And even with all the stuff we have now, I still want it!

    2. What I think is that I am amazed at my pal who uses Sonar productively and likes it. Windows has definitely put up some puzzling barriers to the user, but he’s proof enough that there is a sweet spot to be had if you keep a clean machine and some focus. Half the people I have known who screamed at Windows turned out to need about a weeks’ disk defragmentation and triple virus purges of the crapola they probably picked up from installing too much goofware. Granted, my pal is a former Windows NT help-desker, so he has an edge, but hey, 9 out of 10 babies agree that a clean butt is a happy butt and the tenth is Karl Rove. The REAL “fix” is often just good housekeeping and realistic expectations. Yeah, right, like I never yelled at MY computers….!

    3. Actually, making money about 14 years with Windows machine. Out of the box Windows need to be tweaked for music production, but since Windows 98, it has been very stable, never seen a blue screen. You just need to tweak it the right way and contact the right companies (specialised DAW builders). For a short moment I also fall for the apple OS marketing trick, and traded my Win ME machine in for an Apple Quicksilver with OS X and OS9 because most music hardware were not supported yet under OSX, So had to use OS9 lol. Seen many blue screens on this power tower lol. But to the point, there is no way macs are better suited for music than PC’s, they all have their problems because it is al generic OS. I just don t understand why the music branch never got together and determined to bring out their own platform, maybe based on Unix or Linux, who cares, but they should have brought forward a dedicated platform which could run on PC hardware or if you would have liked mac hardware. Any way many professional studios and film composers also use Windows DAW. It is only that Microsoft is kinda arrogant assuming the user base for music production is small, sure its not billions, but still millions around the globe. I even wrote to Miscrosoft this summer about the issues for DAW users. But al they said is it was up to 3 party developers to solve the potential problems with latency, bandwidth, hardisk I/O optimazation etc.. t I am so sorry I am not a programmer, otherwise by now would have jumped into this obvious market niche. Another thing that puzzles me, why the VST and DAW companies like Cubase, NI, Eastwest, Toontrack etc, Presonus, etc.. don t release Linux Unbuntu versions, so users could abandon Windows and Apple OS.

  13. As someone who still has their original floppies of Windows 1.0 and every iteration since and was in computer sales for the roll out of Windows Bob, WIndows Millennium Edition (Win Me) and Vista and saw the utter disasters of those in terms of customer complaints and returns, not to mention all the hassles of setting up and maintaining Windows based systems at work and home AND have been at times in the TV and Video editing world and having to set up, use, maintain and troubleshoot both Mac based editors (Final Cut and Avid) and Windows based (Adobe Premier and Discreet Edit) I am quite sure that Windows 8 will be the biggest disaster in Microsoft history. Driver support WILL be abominable. Software and Hardware will break on it. Long and conflated driver and setup routines finally perfected on your XP or Vista 1.0 or Vista 2.0 systems (as I call Windows 7….don’t believe me…do an ipconfig in Vista and then in Windows 7 and look at the OFFICIAL Windows version numbering scheme) will not work in Windows 8. And most of all they are trying to harmonize the code between x86 and ARM. Which means any and all tablets using Windows 8 will be way underpowered for the amount of hardware oomph needed to move that shit around just to make a price point, OR way too expensive once the hardware is upgraded to move same said shit around in comparison to an iPad. Remember….they never got WinCE or WinMobile right…..how the hell do you think they can get a combined Win 8 right for either market?

    And really….if you think any of Microsoft’s products were mediocre at best under the reign of Bill Gates….what exactly has Microsoft done well under the reign of Steve Ballmer…..an unmitigated disaster and as Forbes just stated THE worst CEO of any large company in the world.

    The last thing that Microsoft did half way decent in terms of an OS was Microsoft NT in 1995 and it was only decent when the 3rd service pack came out for Windows XP a decade later (which for those of you who do not know the evolution of NT, the base of NT was used for Windows 2000 and XP was the amalgam of Windows 95/98 interface with the Windows 2000/NT code base.

    Sorry, Windows 8 is only going to drive more people to Apple on both the desktop and the tablet/phone space. And as a matter disclosure….I am not an Apple fanboi…..never owned any Apple product and still don’t. My music editing and creation is done on Logic 5.5.1 on a Windows NT based rack mount PC. It just works for me.

      2. Sorry for the personal expletive. Let me fix it for ya….

        Here is the reply sans ad hominem attack…..

        “Yeah…..like Bach had a Mac”.

    2. > I am quite sure that Windows 8 will be the biggest disaster in Microsoft history.

      I agree completely. This is a company struggling to find a way to stay relevant in the modern marketplace, and Windows 8 is a hail-mary attempt to understand what is driving consumer behavior right now. Just like the Kinect was an attempt to cash in on the Nintendo Wii success. Microsoft doesn’t innovate. They copy and mass produce. Always have. But they can’t copy fast enough to be relevant anymore because mobile markets allow for such rapid innovation and streamlining.

    3. Steve Ballmer…..an unmitigated disaster and as Forbes just stated THE worst CEO of any large company in the world. ….. You nailed it.

      For everyone that plays Angry Birds Win8 will be fine. I expect that every power user will find Apple products closer to the Windows experience than Windows itself.

  14. You’ll be able to run your existing 32 bit apps under windows 8 on your PC. The architecture isn’t radically different to Windows 7 the article is scare mongerIng.

  15. Weeeooo weeeeeooooo
    Sound the alarm! Man your battlestations! Windows 8 might suck!
    What will we ever do? Oh wait you say this has happened before? Vista? So what did we do that time? We went back to XP? So what do we do now because I’m soo worried my music will be drastically effected by OS change? Will all my vstis sound different and horrible? God have mercy! Oh I can just keep using windows 7. Oh…..cool, I guess ill put.the.gun away now.

    1. It seems like everybody is either:

      A) Saying Windows 8 sucks; or
      B) Saying that people that say WIndows 8 sucks are noobs, trolls or Apple fanboys.

      What are the features that might benefit musicians? This is looking like Vista to me, and I skipped it completely.

    3. Exactly 🙂 we all stick to Win 7 untill something good or maybe a good linux variant, supported by the major DAW and VST developers, is created.

  16. Windows 8 is fairly rubbish. I think I’ll stick with my 7/XP combo, thank you very much.
    (and yes, I did download the developer preview)

    I’m kinda ed off with microsoft right now. They need to focus on what they do best, which is workstation operating systems. Apple (and, as much as I hate to say, Google/Android) are kings of the tablet world, and it will probably stay that way.

    1. > I’m kinda ed off with microsoft right now. They need to focus on what they do best, which is workstation operating systems.

      Thinking of Windows as a workstation operating system makes me chuckle a little. Their self-proclaimed workstation OS, NT 4, looked pretty silly when compared to UNIX variants at the time. What’s cool is that OSX and iOS can directly trace their lineage all the way back to the very beginning of UNIX in 1969.

  18. well if it is a touch OS, for desktop users it might cost a lil bit to et it, but if it does work smoothly with daws, you literally have all daw’s at your fingertips!

  19. I will stick with Windows 7 unless I get a free copy of Windows 8 to play with. I understand the performance is better, which one would expect for a newer version of Windows, but FORCING the new GUI and not allowing pro users who have been using Windows since 3.1 is a bad idea.

    My problem with Windows 8 is that they don’t allow to me to have a choice, you do it their way or you stay with an older operating system. I think this OS looks great for media center PC’s and tablets, but for a business desktop???

  20. Windows 8 shouldn’t crash like Windows Systems in the past that lost countless hours of creativity, Microsoft would be crazy not to have music timing and latency a top priority, above the interest of it’s majority of customers… wall street business workers.

    1. Never experienced crashes since Win ME, so surprised with people complaining about these. If your hardware is tuned fine and your OS then there should be no chrashes. O yes I had chrashes and blue screens back in 2000 when I switched briefly to Mac Quicksllver. Worst investment ever, after 6 months only got 50% of the purchase price back, obsolete in one year, thats apple.

  24. Win8Metro really is getting bad press and it is due to poor design. I have never seen this much hate for a new operating system. The Windows 8 interface is not efficient and wastes time. I predict a spectacular failure and expect that every power user will find Apple products closer to the Windows experience than windows itself. I have been a long time diehard Windows user. I hate this new interface. This suggests an internal problem at Microsoft and a lack of vision. I predict failure for Microsoft in the business, power user and creative sectors.

    For anyone that plays Angry Birds Win8 will be fine.

    Systems Administrator Reacts to Windows 8 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B4VtNLl6Ca4&feature=related
    How Real People Will Use Windows 8 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v4boTbv9_nU&feature=relmfu
    Will You Upgrade to Windows 8? http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SlD0VbMM4M0&feature=relmfu

  27. Since no one is mentioning Linux, I will. It’s the greatest OS. It’s not on par with the other OS’s in terms of music production (though finally getting there with Bitwig etc.). But as just an OS? Get out of here. There’s no competition. OSX and Windows 7 are around 4gb. Linux’s average is 700mb. That is all. COMMENCE FLAMING.

    1. I would agree to a extent, if only for certain technical aspects. But it is still too much of a “stone soup” recipe…if you know what I mean. Great server OS….not quite there as UNIX has been and still is….but much better developer support from a much wider and diverse group. But there is not nearly the focus as a paid for OS such as OSX and Windows. Not to mention the music developer support.

      Until Linux can escape the two cages that hold it back as a serious contender in the consumer space and more specifically the music developer space….namely the cage of it being known more as a server OS and the other cage being that it’s still too geeky, and WAY too fragmented (so just how many flavors of Linux do you want to support after all) then Linux will remain an unrealized potential in terms of musical production….just as it is in the Tablet World of Android…itself based on Linux.

      Now….if you built a distro from scratch or used one of the music specific distros you could do some decent stuff with say Ardour or Renoise, Seq24, Rosegarden and ZynAddSubFX…to name a few. But in terms of established packages that for years and years have been found on both the Mac and Windows…..then no…Linux will probably never become such a standard OS for music production.

      Not that I wouldn’t like to see that though.

    2. >OSX and Windows 7 are around 4gb. Linux’s average is 700mb

      Well, Angelina Jolie is 5ft 6.5 inches tall. Scarlett Johansson is only 5ft 3 inches tall. Does that mean it’s no competition and Scarlett Johansson is sexier and more beautiful than Angelina Jolie? Or the other way round?

      Does size matter?

      Celebrity heights collected from: http://www.celebheights.com

    3. It is a shame the major DAW companies and VST companies and audio interface companies like Steinberg, Presonus, Universal Audio, Flux, PSP, Image Line, Avid Protools, Sonic Core, RME, Waves, Yamaha, Magix, Roland, Izotope, Softtubes, Brainworx, SPL, Fabfilter etc… have never supported Linux, probably because it is open source and their coding could be visible so anybody could steal their software. However if they grouped together and came up wit a closed paid version of linux called LinDaw for example, specifically written for music production and video editing in mind, and USB dongles for their software, I would think many current PC and Mac users would switch.

      Prism Sound issues linux drivers for its audio interfaces but unfortunately not for Sadie, their mastering suite.

  28. Linux is a great OS and very stable. A friend has started his son out on Hydrogen, the free sequencer and he’s getting good performance from it. The only drawback (just IMO) is that Linux GUIs tend to be pretty spartan. I’m spoiled by the nice conventions of more refined DAWs. Still, be aware of Linux and give it some respect. The mantra from every user I know is STABILITY STABILITY STABILITY.

  29. What I think I’m hearing here is much like what was being said prior to Macs running OSX, that being that everything was rewritten from the ground up to operate and look much like it did before. Of course, Apple did change several things and to this day I still miss creating a folder with just a command-N instead of shift-command-N.
    I also don’t like that everything on a Mac has permissions, but oh well.
    We humans adapt pretty quickly when things work well.

    The larger question is whether MS pulls off their radical change as well as Apple did.
    I still remember people chanting how Apple was going out of business any day and now they have more cash than the federal reserve bank. Things DO change. Whether they change for the better remains to be seen.

    As for me, I’ll stick with my Mac and when I want to use Windows, I’ll click on VirtualBox.

    As a final note, there are still many pros using Gigasampler on a PC and other PC oriented apps and hardware. But almost all the pros still have something Apple somewhere in their rig be it an Ipad or Mac. The same can’t be said of MS.

  30. As an ageing IT pro I’ve seen all this before right back to the BBS and UseNet wars between every platform ‘convert’ that ever lived. I used to argue the toss over what was better, An Atari or an Amiga for example. I remember my father bring a new PC home one day with all its green screen glory and XTree Gold. I then showed him an Amiga 1000 with double the memory and 4096 colours, but I digress, you get the point right? My music making is done on XP and has been for years, its solid, it works and that’s what is important. My laptop has only just moved to Win7, I’m pretty happy with that but am I likely to go Win8 anytime soon? No, because I have learn’t my lesson the hard way and these days I’ll let others stub their toes on the bleeding edge and watch from the sidelines. These days if your platform works for you then great, in other words move when you have a compelling reason to do so. There was a comment above that suggested more people that make music for a living use macs, that’s probably true on the basis that somehow there is an expectation that you should BUT the reality is these people are in the minority (making money wise). the vast majority use pc for making music. So if MS screw these people then they do so at their own risk. Personally I am not wedded to to windows so if MS do screw me over then hello Apple, simple really.

  32. I like how you argue that the start button is gone, because ‘everything was in one place’, when in reality, to put a start button on it again IS actually the thing that would put everything in different places. Newb, right click lower right screen. And start typing anything on the start page, it works just like the start button used to. Instead of a button I now have a page that does the same things, and more. These kinds of things are only problems with people stuck in the past, who would still be running word perfect on dos given the choice. I’ve been using, Windows 8 since it was available in beta, and would never go back. Its a better windows (that runs Cubase just fine, RME needs to do some work), its a bold new tablet OS, that does have some maturation issues as expected, and its the smartest gamble Micorosft has made since Balmer took over.

  33. oops, “right click lower right screen” I meant lower left, typo.

    Its like conservatives whining about the liberal press. Only now, its the Windows crowd only hearing from the Mac press.

  35. My 32-bit Windows XP was really outdated. I needed parental controls and many new things.
    But the biggest thing I lost is Windows 8 soundfont support. My Soundblaster Audigy is now without soundfonts and I can’t play my MIDI keyboard without latency anymore.

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