Win 8 Install Experience

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I have a Toshiba A665 that I specifically use for my experimenting. Yesterday, I took the plunge and did an upgrade, not a clean install. This is probably not the wisest choice for everyone, but I wanted to try this first.

The Windows Compatibility Advisor Report let me know that Avast wouldn’t work and the following would have to be fixed with Windows update….Intel Management Interface, Toshiba Shock Sensor Driver, Toshiba x64 ACPI. I started the install which stopped to instruct me to remove Avast which I did with Revo and then the installation went very smoothly. Everything on the laptop and is working including AntiMalware Bytes, SAS, Firefox, Opera, Foxit, Chrome, Adobe Flash and other stuff. The sound was working and My Documents My Pictures were all maintained. Connecting to the web was no problem. In place of Avast, I got MSE which is running perfectly fine. SAS & MBAM updated w/o issues. WUpdate worked fine as well.

Windows 8 told me which programs I had installed that would slow bootup. My FreeCell and Mahjongg are missing. I’m not sure that I like Metro and navigating around is not intuitive in some places, but so far I am having fun with it. I have to admit that the install was much less painful than I thought it would be. I also am not convinced that the OS is worth moving from a well-running Windows 7 box.

The setup on my laptop was pretty uncomplicated to start with. That might have had something to do with the ease of use in my case. And,I did take a chance doing the upgrade rather than a clean install, but I can fool with that later.

Diane

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Hi Diane,

As a consumer preview beta, Windows 8 should be installed as a clean install. It is not ready for prime time, so doing an upgrade install will not give you an accurate assessment of the current state of Windows 8.

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I installed Win 8 CP directly over Win 8 DP, then reinstalled all my apps from Win 8 DP. There are some operational changes which I will have to see how to use. I do not know if Metro can be turned off yet, but the install went very smoothly. Did it after work last night and I was tired at the time. Win 8 installs seem to be as easy or easier than Win 7. The only difference I saw was not having the custom install choice when booting to the DVD (perhaps I did something wrong although I’ve done it numerous times before). I actually booted to Win 8 DP, inserted the Win 8 CP DVD and installed from there. It did give me a windows.old folder to capture stuff from. This was an unexpected surprise.

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I went ahead and reinstalled Win 8 CP as a clean install over itself. The installation failed and Windows reverted itself back to my first Win 8 upgrade install. The OS ” didn’t know why the installation failed.” Not giving up and not having much at risk on this laptop, I tried the install again and this time it was successful. I saw no appreciable difference in performance. I didn’t have sound and the resolution was stuck on 1024 x 768, but getting the drivers for the mobile Nvidia card and onboard sound took care of those issues. I now have several hours of reconfiguration to do. I couldn’t get the Realtek WLan driver to install “because the driver didn’t recognize the OS”. I don’t know what that driver does, but I have sound with just the Realtek audio drive itself. It’s a wireless LAN driver, but right now I’m wireless and have sound.
I put it in because Belarc showed me it was there before. I’m not sure what it does exactly.

I have a yellow ! in Device Mgr for an unknown device, but I think it could be the webcam or the Synapse touchpad that I don’t use and didn’t bother with. Otherwise, so far, so good.

Diane

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I installed Win 8 CP directly over Win 8 DP, then reinstalled all my apps from Win 8 DP. There are some operational changes which I will have to see how to use. I do not know if Metro can be turned off yet, but the install went very smoothly. Did it after work last night and I was tired at the time. Win 8 installs seem to be as easy or easier than Win 7. The only difference I saw was not having the custom install choice when booting to the DVD (perhaps I did something wrong although I’ve done it numerous times before). I actually booted to Win 8 DP, inserted the Win 8 CP DVD and installed from there. It did give me a windows.old folder to capture stuff from. This was an unexpected surprise.

An entire world may open for you if you have x-ray vision and a sharp mouse pointer. If you point the tip of the pointer to the bottom left corner of your screen you will see an alternative to whatever display you have on-screen, and far more conveniently, if you go to the bottom (or top) right corner, where the famous or infamous ‘View Desktop’ is in Windows 7, you may find a small rectangle that corresponds to the Win 7 rectangle, but this time offers far more functionality.

As you cruise upward from there, you will find your pointer in an auto-hide taskbar that contains Search, Share, Start, Devices and Settings icons, with the option for more detail, notably PC settings, which equals Control Panel.

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I would take a trip through the new Windows 8 forumfor many pointers and discussions concerning installing and using Win 8 CP.

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AMEN!

Bump! Bump!

The Doctor

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Doing a successful upgrade to a beta version of Windows 8 is a good sign of things to come as far as upgrade installations go. MS might be getting better at it too but one thing tends to remain the same; if you have a really messed up system, there is a better than average chance it will translate in some form to the upgraded installation, even if itisn’t noticed from the original setup.

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