Windows 8.1 Update 1… it’s not that bad (REALLY!)

Another Windows 8.1 blog post… crap, you’re going to be hating on it again. Aren’t you? No, not this time.

So I had to reload my computer’s operating system because things were getting “glitchy.” At the time I was running Windows 7. And by “glitchy” I mean things wouldn’t work correctly for no good reason. Programs would steal focus ripping me out of a full-screen game (Diablo 3). Needless to say, being ripped out of Diablo 3 while your character’s in a fight might just end up with your character dead. Windows Explorer would crash for no good reason when right-clicking on a file. What was causing it? I really don’t know but my working theory is that the Windows Registry was probably… uh… broken? Corrupt? Oh well, whatever the reason, things weren’t working correctly. So I reloaded my operating system.

I unplugged all of my SATA hard drives from their power connectors except for my SSD on which my OS will be installed on. I then popped in a freshly burned copy of Windows 8.1 64-bit into the DVD-RW drive and did a clean install. Now, I have an upgrade key so installing Windows 8.1 with an upgrade key is a bit more complicated than with a full license. I’m not going to go into the process of doing that here because that’ll just bore you and that’s not the point of this blog post.

Anyways, I installed Windows 8.1 and updated it to Update 1 and so far things have not been that bad at all. I have been using it for about a week now and have started to even use some of the ModernUI apps that are on the Windows Store (with ModernMIX of course). Oh yeah, I installed Start8 and ModernMIX to bring back a more desktop-like experience. With these programs installed the Windows 8.1 user interface isn’t really that bad.

I have WindowBlinds installed but I’m still using the default Windows 8.1 theme because there’s some kind of bug in WindowBlinds in which if you use any other theme other than the default Windows 8.1 theme the secondary taskbars on secondary monitors keep jumping up and down like a kangaroo.

What does that leave me? The default Windows 8.1 theme, the bland colored theme that comes with Windows 8.1. Do I care? Honestly, at first I cared but I guess as time progressed and I used the operating system more the user interface design started to not matter to me more and more. So what if I don’t have a stylish theme? Big deal!

Oh, back to Start8 and ModernMIX. I use several ModernUI apps including Facebook, Twitter, Slacker Radio, and WeatherBug. These apps are great. Now that I look back on the hate that I spewed regarding Windows 8/8.1 in the past, I have to wonder why I did that. Some of these ModernUI apps are great and with ModernMIX it makes them coexist with the traditional desktop just like any other desktop program that I have installed on my machine. And Start8 makes it so that I can completely avoid the ModernUI Start Screen. Yes, I have not seen the ModernUI Start Screen at all since I installed Start8. Again I ask… why did I hate Windows 8/8.1 in the past? I really don’t know.

OK, so how is Windows 8.1 Update 1 running on the same hardware when compared to Windows 7? Actually… Windows 8.1 Update 1 runs better than Windows 7 ever did on the same hardware. it runs smoother and faster than Windows 7. I did have problems in the past with Windows 8/8.1 but I think that was because I upgraded to Windows 8 from Windows 7. Now that I look back on it, I think that was a major source of all the pain that I had with Windows 8/8.1 in the past. Upgrade bad! Clean install good!

So there you have it… a positive Windows 8/8.1 blog post from me. Did you ever think that you’d see one on this site? Probably not.

Last updated on Wednesday, June 11th, 2014 at 6:42 PM by trparky.