Installing the Windows 8 consumer preview on the Acer Iconia W500 was met with the same limitation I found when installing the developer preview and im sure ill find when installing the finished product. The hard drive in the machine is 30GB Windows 8 wants 16GB free, that’s 53% of the hard drive just to install. booting from a bootable USB (no optical drive) would negate this and you can delete partitions but to upgrade will be a nightmare. I managed to delete EVERY program off the machine then went ahead ripping whatever out I could and keep Windows running. to give you an idea of how difficult a task that was here is my drive stats right at this very moment (2 days since install)
The install itself was fairly painless as is come to expect with Windows these days few clicks aaaaaaaaaaaaaand wait. I was installing from a USB drive (having 1.75GB of Windows files on C:\ didn’t help with trying to clear the prerequisite space) making the install a little slower than I imagine it would be otherwise.
The main thing I note when Windows 8 consumer preview loaded for the first time was that it seemed altogether more solid so with wreckless abandon i went about my swiping ways…. or I would have had it worked. Metro was unresponsive to my touch although the screen pulsed where i had my finger showing a connection was made but the screen would not budge i swiped and prodded for a bit with no joy and went to the desktop, this worked fine with touch and after a run through the initial updates and a reboot all was well with metro.
While flicking through the metro apps I found camera which seems to record if you tap the screen so when your browsing around you end up with random videos of yourself and if set to picture mode random pictures. Other than that I found the metro tiles easy to navigate and move to where I want. Microsoft are really pushing this over using the desktop and I had to move move my desktop tile from somewhere tacked on the end to pride of place. Microsoft you may have taken my start button but your not getting rid of my desktop that easily!
There is an inbuilt hardware start button on the Iconia anyway so the loss isn’t all that bad on this machine one thing I did find, try as I might I could not get the start menu up by swiping I just could not do it, I even paused midway through typing this sentence and tried again. Unless im doing something wrong im glad of the hardware start button especially when using the Icnonia without the keyboard and therefore mouse attached.
The start…. box? is accessible with the mouse in the lower left and if you drag upwards from the bottom left you get what is essentially alt+tab just horizontal not vertical. you can also bring it up with Windows key and tab.
Something else noticed while creating this blog wen print screening the screen dims for a second to show capture and auto saves them to your pictures, no click as with IOS devices but it will be familiar to users of these devices.
Other things to get used to are a few occasions I have clicked the left most pinned item and not gone all the way to the start box (really has this actually got a name?) as there is no physical start menu icon. I’m not sure how to feel about the removal of the iconic… er icon myself.
Show desktop has gone walkabout too although Windows D serves the purpose. This is gone even with the following ticked
I’m going to leave the above in…. although I found it! you have to bury the mouse in the very bottom right to get peek to work, not when moving your mouse over the show desktop ‘button’ as it states as there isn’t one.
I use live writer to create my blog posts and when opening it decided it needed .net framework 3.5 so off it popped downloaded and installed it and I was away gone are they days of you need X and Y for Z to run….. go find it.
One thing everyone will be glad about… using the compatibility trouble-shooter or just setting to win xp and run as admin everyone’s favourite touch game works.
These are just some impressions a couple of days in everything worked (metro required a reboot) ‘out of the box’ on the Iconia. Drivers for sound, touch, the various external buttons…. It certainly feels like a robust polished operating system already but I cant help feeling they should have called it Windows 7.5 and classed it as an upgrade. Its quite a change but once you realise that if you get lost find a corner and jam your mouse into it you get options its all downhill on the learning curve. Not sure im fully converted to metro, the way you select a link and it takes you to metro IE wasn’t just annoying it infuriated me and I couldn’t figure out for the life of me how to change it ended up using start an run to run iexplore.exe and ultimately swapping to Firefox.
Goodbye start button, goodbye BSOD (now its the sad face of doom?) and hello Window 8
4 thoughts on “Windows 8 consumer preview on the Iconia Tab”
Nice write up and I’m really enjoying Windows 8 CP on the Iconia W500 although I don’t have the keyboard. I booted from a USB Flash drive, so space wasn’t an issue as I removed all partitions, and the install took about 20 minutes and touch worked instantly without any reboot.
Just curious if you installed the touch screen firmware update as this really improved the touch screen for me?
I have yet to install anything additional to Windows itself. The issue with the mouse jumping to the bottom right of the screen seems not to have returned. How are you finding accessing “start” with no keyboard? I found I have to use the hardware button.
As I said I would recommend installing the firmware update for the touch screen as I found it far more responsive afterwards (not to mention that those horrible bottom right phantom screen presses stopped).
You mean swiping in from the right? It can be a little hit and miss but I find that if I start from just off the screen (the black border) and move slowly but deliberately it works more often than not. Hopefully this is something that will feed back in the telemetry.
{"id":null,"mode":"button","open_style":"in_place","currency_code":"GBP","currency_symbol":"\u00a3","currency_type":"decimal","blank_flag_url":"https:\/\/thedigitallifestyle.com\/w\/wp-content\/plugins\/tip-jar-wp\/\/assets\/images\/flags\/blank.gif","flag_sprite_url":"https:\/\/thedigitallifestyle.com\/w\/wp-content\/plugins\/tip-jar-wp\/\/assets\/images\/flags\/flags.png","default_amount":500,"top_media_type":"none","featured_image_url":false,"featured_embed":"","header_media":null,"file_download_attachment_data":null,"recurring_options_enabled":true,"recurring_options":{"never":{"selected":true,"after_output":"One time only"},"weekly":{"selected":false,"after_output":"Every week"},"monthly":{"selected":false,"after_output":"Every month"},"yearly":{"selected":false,"after_output":"Every year"}},"strings":{"current_user_email":"","current_user_name":"","link_text":"Leave a tip","complete_payment_button_error_text":"Check info and try again","payment_verb":"Pay","payment_request_label":"TheDigitalLifestyle.com","form_has_an_error":"Please check and fix the errors above","general_server_error":"Something isn't working right at the moment. Please try again.","form_title":"TheDigitalLifestyle.com","form_subtitle":null,"currency_search_text":"Country or Currency here","other_payment_option":"Other payment option","manage_payments_button_text":"Manage your payments","thank_you_message":"Thank you for being a supporter!","payment_confirmation_title":"TheDigitalLifestyle.com","receipt_title":"Your Receipt","print_receipt":"Print Receipt","email_receipt":"Email Receipt","email_receipt_sending":"Sending receipt...","email_receipt_success":"Email receipt successfully sent","email_receipt_failed":"Email receipt failed to send. Please try again.","receipt_payee":"Paid to","receipt_statement_descriptor":"This will show up on your statement as","receipt_date":"Date","receipt_transaction_id":"Transaction ID","receipt_transaction_amount":"Amount","refund_payer":"Refund from","login":"Log in to manage your payments","manage_payments":"Manage Payments","transactions_title":"Your Transactions","transaction_title":"Transaction Receipt","transaction_period":"Plan Period","arrangements_title":"Your Plans","arrangement_title":"Manage Plan","arrangement_details":"Plan Details","arrangement_id_title":"Plan ID","arrangement_payment_method_title":"Payment Method","arrangement_amount_title":"Plan Amount","arrangement_renewal_title":"Next renewal date","arrangement_action_cancel":"Cancel Plan","arrangement_action_cant_cancel":"Cancelling is currently not available.","arrangement_action_cancel_double":"Are you sure you'd like to cancel?","arrangement_cancelling":"Cancelling Plan...","arrangement_cancelled":"Plan Cancelled","arrangement_failed_to_cancel":"Failed to cancel plan","back_to_plans":"\u2190 Back to Plans","update_payment_method_verb":"Update","sca_auth_description":"Your have a pending renewal payment which requires authorization.","sca_auth_verb":"Authorize renewal payment","sca_authing_verb":"Authorizing payment","sca_authed_verb":"Payment successfully authorized!","sca_auth_failed":"Unable to authorize! Please try again.","login_button_text":"Log in","login_form_has_an_error":"Please check and fix the errors above","uppercase_search":"Search","lowercase_search":"search","uppercase_page":"Page","lowercase_page":"page","uppercase_items":"Items","lowercase_items":"items","uppercase_per":"Per","lowercase_per":"per","uppercase_of":"Of","lowercase_of":"of","back":"Back to plans","zip_code_placeholder":"Zip\/Postal Code","download_file_button_text":"Download File","input_field_instructions":{"tip_amount":{"placeholder_text":"How much would you like to tip?","initial":{"instruction_type":"normal","instruction_message":"How much would you like to tip? Choose any currency."},"empty":{"instruction_type":"error","instruction_message":"How much would you like to tip? Choose any currency."},"invalid_curency":{"instruction_type":"error","instruction_message":"Please choose a valid currency."}},"recurring":{"placeholder_text":"Recurring","initial":{"instruction_type":"normal","instruction_message":"How often would you like to give this?"},"success":{"instruction_type":"success","instruction_message":"How often would you like to give this?"},"empty":{"instruction_type":"error","instruction_message":"How often would you like to give this?"}},"name":{"placeholder_text":"Name on Credit Card","initial":{"instruction_type":"normal","instruction_message":"Enter the name on your card."},"success":{"instruction_type":"success","instruction_message":"Enter the name on your card."},"empty":{"instruction_type":"error","instruction_message":"Please enter the name on your card."}},"privacy_policy":{"terms_title":"Terms and conditions","terms_body":null,"terms_show_text":"View Terms","terms_hide_text":"Hide Terms","initial":{"instruction_type":"normal","instruction_message":"I agree to the terms."},"unchecked":{"instruction_type":"error","instruction_message":"Please agree to the terms."},"checked":{"instruction_type":"success","instruction_message":"I agree to the terms."}},"email":{"placeholder_text":"Your email address","initial":{"instruction_type":"normal","instruction_message":"Enter your email address"},"success":{"instruction_type":"success","instruction_message":"Enter your email address"},"blank":{"instruction_type":"error","instruction_message":"Enter your email address"},"not_an_email_address":{"instruction_type":"error","instruction_message":"Make sure you have entered a valid email address"}},"note_with_tip":{"placeholder_text":"Your note here...","initial":{"instruction_type":"normal","instruction_message":"Attach a note to your tip (optional)"},"empty":{"instruction_type":"normal","instruction_message":"Attach a note to your tip (optional)"},"not_empty_initial":{"instruction_type":"normal","instruction_message":"Attach a note to your tip (optional)"},"saving":{"instruction_type":"normal","instruction_message":"Saving note..."},"success":{"instruction_type":"success","instruction_message":"Note successfully saved!"},"error":{"instruction_type":"error","instruction_message":"Unable to save note note at this time. Please try again."}},"email_for_login_code":{"placeholder_text":"Your email address","initial":{"instruction_type":"normal","instruction_message":"Enter your email to log in."},"success":{"instruction_type":"success","instruction_message":"Enter your email to log in."},"blank":{"instruction_type":"error","instruction_message":"Enter your email to log in."},"empty":{"instruction_type":"error","instruction_message":"Enter your email to log in."}},"login_code":{"initial":{"instruction_type":"normal","instruction_message":"Check your email and enter the login code."},"success":{"instruction_type":"success","instruction_message":"Check your email and enter the login code."},"blank":{"instruction_type":"error","instruction_message":"Check your email and enter the login code."},"empty":{"instruction_type":"error","instruction_message":"Check your email and enter the login code."}},"stripe_all_in_one":{"initial":{"instruction_type":"normal","instruction_message":"Enter your credit card details here."},"empty":{"instruction_type":"error","instruction_message":"Enter your credit card details here."},"success":{"instruction_type":"normal","instruction_message":"Enter your credit card details here."},"invalid_number":{"instruction_type":"error","instruction_message":"The card number is not a valid credit card number."},"invalid_expiry_month":{"instruction_type":"error","instruction_message":"The card's expiration month is invalid."},"invalid_expiry_year":{"instruction_type":"error","instruction_message":"The card's expiration year is invalid."},"invalid_cvc":{"instruction_type":"error","instruction_message":"The card's security code is invalid."},"incorrect_number":{"instruction_type":"error","instruction_message":"The card number is incorrect."},"incomplete_number":{"instruction_type":"error","instruction_message":"The card number is incomplete."},"incomplete_cvc":{"instruction_type":"error","instruction_message":"The card's security code is incomplete."},"incomplete_expiry":{"instruction_type":"error","instruction_message":"The card's expiration date is incomplete."},"incomplete_zip":{"instruction_type":"error","instruction_message":"The card's zip code is incomplete."},"expired_card":{"instruction_type":"error","instruction_message":"The card has expired."},"incorrect_cvc":{"instruction_type":"error","instruction_message":"The card's security code is incorrect."},"incorrect_zip":{"instruction_type":"error","instruction_message":"The card's zip code failed validation."},"invalid_expiry_year_past":{"instruction_type":"error","instruction_message":"The card's expiration year is in the past"},"card_declined":{"instruction_type":"error","instruction_message":"The card was declined."},"missing":{"instruction_type":"error","instruction_message":"There is no card on a customer that is being charged."},"processing_error":{"instruction_type":"error","instruction_message":"An error occurred while processing the card."},"invalid_request_error":{"instruction_type":"error","instruction_message":"Unable to process this payment, please try again or use alternative method."},"invalid_sofort_country":{"instruction_type":"error","instruction_message":"The billing country is not accepted by SOFORT. Please try another country."}}}},"fetched_oembed_html":false}
Nice write up and I’m really enjoying Windows 8 CP on the Iconia W500 although I don’t have the keyboard. I booted from a USB Flash drive, so space wasn’t an issue as I removed all partitions, and the install took about 20 minutes and touch worked instantly without any reboot.
Just curious if you installed the touch screen firmware update as this really improved the touch screen for me?
I have yet to install anything additional to Windows itself. The issue with the mouse jumping to the bottom right of the screen seems not to have returned. How are you finding accessing “start” with no keyboard? I found I have to use the hardware button.
As I said I would recommend installing the firmware update for the touch screen as I found it far more responsive afterwards (not to mention that those horrible bottom right phantom screen presses stopped).
You mean swiping in from the right? It can be a little hit and miss but I find that if I start from just off the screen (the black border) and move slowly but deliberately it works more often than not. Hopefully this is something that will feed back in the telemetry.
The actual name of the “start box” is “the switcher”.