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Windows 8.1 |OT| There's your start button

Jinaar

Member
and like an idiot i didnt back anything up

so i lost like 4-5 months worth of art and psd files

i feel so down right now..............

Doran, try the application "iCare Data Recovery Professional" to get data back, even on a formatted drive. I've used this at work recently a few times, on drives that have been formatted and on servers with data deleted completely off their folders successfully. Obviously, most of the time it is still luck due to whether the blocks have been over written yet or not on your hard drive.

I think they have a trial version that allows up to 10 files to be restored (If I remember correctly) and even if not, you can still see what is restore-able.
 
I thought this update broke middle clicking for me but after about an hour of trying different things it turns out my middle button now only responds if i hold it down like a half a second longer.
 

Pakkidis

Member
Windows 8.1 is finally activated but I had to do a refresh pc option and I had to reinstall most of my programs.

I have an ssd and was wondering what are some of the things you are doing to optimize things. I have done the following. Moved my temp folder over to the harddrive, moved documents, downloads,pics,music,movies to hardrive, moved search index to harddrive, disabled hibernation mode.
 
So it seems I have an odd issue (google tells me I'm not alone).

I have a couple of USB harddrives. After a couple of minutes they seem to go 'sleep'.
I still see them in 'this pc' but whenever I access them, I hear the same sound they make when you first turn them on and I have to wait a couple of seconds...

I already disabled the usb powering down option in energy management.. anything else I should look into?
 

Lima

Member
So it seems I have an odd issue (google tells me I'm not alone).

I have a couple of USB harddrives. After a couple of minutes they seem to go 'sleep'.
I still see them in 'this pc' but whenever I access them, I hear the same sound they make when you first turn them on and I have to wait a couple of seconds...

I already disabled the usb powering down option in energy management.. anything else I should look into?

This is related to the USB controller in the case of your external drive. Other than trying to alter its firmware or cracking the case to use the HDD in a different one, there is nothing you can do.
 

SCHUEY F1

Unconfirmed Member
After my clean install of 8 than to 8.1, my PC feels so much better. Sounds better as well. Doesn't seem to be working so hard all the time.

I ended up rebuilding my Xbox Music collection on the PC and in the cloud. Finally have everything going smooth.

Quick question if you download one of you Xbox Video shows/slash movies and you play it on other Windows 8 devices not using the same account?
 

DarkFlow

Banned
Same exact problem for me. Fuck this.


Uhh, no we didn't. They said I'd have to reinstall all my apps, which a tech company as big as Microsoft is should know is a word that has very specific connotations that go along with it. They never said this would happen.

Again, you never install a beta as your main OS unless you're fully prepared to lose everything.
 

jediyoshi

Member
I sirously can't beileve we have to reinstall all of our programs. You would think an update of this magnitude Microsoft would have thought things out.

You think with the magnitude of what you stood to have lost, you would have thought their warnings out.
 

teh_pwn

"Saturated fat causes heart disease as much as Brawndo is what plants crave."
Libraries appears to be broken. Nothing shows up, I add a video folder, still nothing, then I add again and get an error that it's already there but it's not.
 

mm04

Member
Just in addition to this, for anyone else on the preview wanting to keep their programs, you can mount the iso virtually rather than putting on USB or DVD. I followed this guide

So I'm about to do this, how can I tell if I have the 64bit or 32bit ISO version on my USB stick? My version of 8.0 and Preview 8.1 are 64bit, but I've had Microsoft's website send me a friggin' 32bit version before unbeknownst to me and I had to reinstall after I realized it.
 

dLMN8R

Member
Do anybody else have this problem?

My apps doesnt shut down after i drag them down to the bottom.

they are still active in the background.


do anybody know how to fix this?

damn annoying have all the apps running in the background even when they should have been shut down.
Here's the long detailed explanation, in case you're curious. This is an intentional change to Windows 8.1 in how background app management works.

Windows 8 was inherently designed in a way that you should never have to close your apps. The Process Lifetime Manager is a new feature in Windows 8 which automatically handles all that for you. Apps might temporarily continue to consume memory or can be suspended to disk, but only so they can be instantly resumed. If that memory or disk is ever needed for anything else, it's instantly freed up. Similarly, if those apps register for any background tasks like playing music, getting email, listening to push notifications, etc. they won't be closed.

It's similar to how smartphones manage tasks, especially iOS.


Still, people wanted to close apps. Why? There were really only two reasons that could be found during research:

1) The app was behaving badly, and the user wanted to close and reopen it to start "fresh"
2) The app was no longer necessary, was taking up room in the task switcher and back stack, and the user wanted to make it "go away" so it didn't show up there.


In Windows 8.1, #1 is handled by a heuristic. If you drag-down an app and immediately re-launch it, it'll start from a fresh load even though the drag-down didn't at first close the app

#2 still works fine.


So in the end, those things still work, while at the same time, in the event that someone dragged-down an app but later wanted to resume instantly where they left off, that works too.
 

Guri

Member
Libraries appears to be broken. Nothing shows up, I add a video folder, still nothing, then I add again and get an error that it's already there but it's not.

Is the problem that your libraries are not showing? In the file explorer, right-click on the navigation panel and click on "Show libraries"
 

t-ramp

Member
So can I update to 8.1 on RT today?
I don't think Microsoft has made the update available after they pulled it to fix some problems. Didn't see it when I just checked on my Surface.

On the other hand, 8.1 is working well on my desktop PC. Nothing to complain about.
 

GaussTek

Member
Guys, I finally updated to 8.1.

Almost everything is working fine after I download all the driver updates from Sony (I have a Vaio 14'' Laptop).

Except for one thing: My external USB 3.0 Hard Drive just goes to sleep after 10 minutes or so, and, whenever I want to access it, there is a 5-10 seconds delay for the HDD to fire up.

This NEVER happened with Windows 8.

I've already tried to mess around with the Power Management settings for the USB device, but nothing helps.

Seems some other people has the same issue (after googling a bit).

Any ideas?
 

Lynn616

Member
What happened to being able to search within apps? Before I could use the search charm and there was a list of all my apps under the search bar. Now I have to launch the app to search in that app.
 

teh_pwn

"Saturated fat causes heart disease as much as Brawndo is what plants crave."
Is the problem that your libraries are not showing? In the file explorer, right-click on the navigation panel and click on "Show libraries"

No, they're listed, but beyond local user documents they're empty. Videos library is empty.

It could be because I hacked the registry to remove skydrive from hogging up my explorer window, because my current PC doesn't have this issue and I have not removed skydrive. I don't know how I'm going to use libraries with them crammed so far low on the bottom right.
 

Guri

Member
No, they're listed, but beyond local user documents they're empty. Videos library is empty.

It could be because I hacked the registry to remove skydrive from hogging up my explorer window, because my current PC doesn't have this issue and I have not removed skydrive. I don't know how I'm going to use libraries with them crammed so far low on the bottom right.

Could you try this?

restore-windows-8-libraries.png
 
I tried updating through the Windows store, but all I get when trying to install it is "couldn't update the system reserved partition." What should I do?
 

Dwayne

Member
Updated to 8.1, had a problem with my soundcard. Read somewhere that going into sleep mode and coming out fixes it. Put my PC into sleep mode, tapped on the keyboard, then the mouse, then the power button to turn it back on, nothing. Unplugged everything externally and internally bit by bit trying to power it on (besides the case to motherboard cabling, obviously) and nothing. Think the PSU has gone :(
 

Sarquiss_

Member
Just finished installing Windows 8.1 Enterprise on my new SSD and it won't accept my Windows 8 Enterprise key.....

Has anyone successfully been able to use their Windows 8 Enterprise key with Windows 8.1?
 
What happened to being able to search within apps? Before I could use the search charm and there was a list of all my apps under the search bar. Now I have to launch the app to search in that app.
Oh, that's right. That was useful. This new search js starting to look like a real downgrade. It doesn't do things as good.
 

Card Boy

Banned
So the only way to get a traditional start menu like Windows 7 is through a 3rd party addon?

What free stuff do people use?

Also MSDN copies can't auto update to 8.1, what a joke.
 
This is related to the USB controller in the case of your external drive. Other than trying to alter its firmware or cracking the case to use the HDD in a different one, there is nothing you can do.

Well it didn't happen in 8.. so Microsoft can do something about it :p
 
Anyone had weird sound cutout issues since updating(particularly, the last 8.1 update)? I'll be listening to an album via Xbox Music and suddenly the sound will cut out and nothing will work across the board.

Edit: Nevermind, I'm a fool. Just had a look at the hdmi cable and it seems to be peeling. Replaced it and everything is fine.

Any nice improvements that might not be obvious? Been using preview since it came out so there shouldn't be too much.
 
*reads last few pages*

Yeah.. I'll wait for 8.2

In a way I'm glad I updated to 8.1 on the first day. I was just thinking that if I had waited and read this thread, there's no way I would have had the courage to update. I don't like 8 or 8.1 much but it's functional and luckily I haven't run into some of the catastrophic issues people are posting about.

So the only way to get a traditional start menu like Windows 7 is through a 3rd party addon?

What free stuff do people use?

Also MSDN copies can't auto update to 8.1, what a joke.

This seems popular

http://www.iobit.com/iobitstartmenu8.php
 

Mindwipe

Member
Here's the long detailed explanation, in case you're curious. This is an intentional change to Windows 8.1 in how background app management works.

Windows 8 was inherently designed in a way that you should never have to close your apps. The Process Lifetime Manager is a new feature in Windows 8 which automatically handles all that for you. Apps might temporarily continue to consume memory or can be suspended to disk, but only so they can be instantly resumed. If that memory or disk is ever needed for anything else, it's instantly freed up. Similarly, if those apps register for any background tasks like playing music, getting email, listening to push notifications, etc. they won't be closed.

It's similar to how smartphones manage tasks, especially iOS.


Still, people wanted to close apps. Why? There were really only two reasons that could be found during research:

1) The app was behaving badly, and the user wanted to close and reopen it to start "fresh"
2) The app was no longer necessary, was taking up room in the task switcher and back stack, and the user wanted to make it "go away" so it didn't show up there.


In Windows 8.1, #1 is handled by a heuristic. If you drag-down an app and immediately re-launch it, it'll start from a fresh load even though the drag-down didn't at first close the app

#2 still works fine.


So in the end, those things still work, while at the same time, in the event that someone dragged-down an app but later wanted to resume instantly where they left off, that works too.

What a dumb fucking decision that was.

Customers don't trust heuristics. Even Apple have found that, and much to their cost - they're stuck with a legion of genius helpdesk staff telling customers they should close all their apps because it seems to work, and a UI that sucks for doing it because they think that nobody should ever need to, and users don't agree.

So MS deliberately copied that concept? Dumb, dumb, dumb.
 

Honey Bunny

Member
Guys, I finally updated to 8.1.

Almost everything is working fine after I download all the driver updates from Sony (I have a Vaio 14'' Laptop).

Except for one thing: My external USB 3.0 Hard Drive just goes to sleep after 10 minutes or so, and, whenever I want to access it, there is a 5-10 seconds delay for the HDD to fire up.

This NEVER happened with Windows 8.

I've already tried to mess around with the Power Management settings for the USB device, but nothing helps.

Seems some other people has the same issue (after googling a bit).

Any ideas?

I''m getting this too. no ideas so do tell us if you find anything on it.

Also, my Arial Regular font disappeared. I noticed because Chrome and Steam automatically changed to arial italic for a ton of stuff. I put the arial regular file back where it should be, but there are still some things in chrome displaying in italic that I can't get rid of. Super annoying!
 

Sethos

Banned
Sorry if this has already been discussed but is it possible to download a full 8.1 installation somewhere? I reinstall my OS every few months for that clean slate feeling but I'd hate having to patch it straight after installation. Would love a straight 8.1 installation.
 

aaaaa0

Member
What a dumb fucking decision that was.

Customers don't trust heuristics. Even Apple have found that, and much to their cost - they're stuck with a legion of genius helpdesk staff telling customers they should close all their apps because it seems to work, and a UI that sucks for doing it because they think that nobody should ever need to, and users don't agree.

So MS deliberately copied that concept? Dumb, dumb, dumb.

Just drag the app down, then hold it there until it spins. That will actually kill it.
 

Mindwipe

Member
Just drag the app down, then hold it there until it spins. That will actually kill it.

So they've made the app closing mechanism dumber, slower and more hidden, and that's not a boneheaded move for some reason?

The people in MS who made that decision are an absolute cancer in the company. If I'm using Windows it's because I don't want fricking iOS.
 

hipbabboom

Huh? What did I say? Did I screw up again? :(
So they've made the app closing mechanism dumber, slower and more hidden, and that's not a boneheaded move for some reason?

The people in MS who made that decision are an absolute cancer in the company. If I'm using Windows it's because I don't want fricking iOS.

I'm a little confused. What are you upset about:
  1. Apps can be closed?
  2. Apps, when you're using touch-only, have to be dragged to the bottom to be closed?
  3. Windows manages apps that aren't in use so they don't take up resources?
  4. Someone tried to explain something to you and mentioned Apple.
  5. You're NOT running out of resources
 

Nero3000

Member
What a dumb fucking decision that was.

Customers don't trust heuristics. Even Apple have found that, and much to their cost - they're stuck with a legion of genius helpdesk staff telling customers they should close all their apps because it seems to work, and a UI that sucks for doing it because they think that nobody should ever need to, and users don't agree.

So MS deliberately copied that concept? Dumb, dumb, dumb.

Seriously, what is your problem here? The apps are not wasting your resources and they are out of the way.

You're just being paranoid for paranoids sake.
 
So they've made the app closing mechanism dumber, slower and more hidden, and that's not a boneheaded move for some reason?

The people in MS who made that decision are an absolute cancer in the company. If I'm using Windows it's because I don't want fricking iOS.

Dear lord. If it bothers you that much then either:

Hold down Windows+Tab then right click and press close
Mouse to the top/botton left then slide up/down then right click and press close.
Partly swipe in to bring up the menu then long press/rightclick and hit close
 

Mindwipe

Member
I'm a little confused. What are you upset about:
  1. Apps can be closed?
  2. Apps, when you're using touch-only, have to be dragged to the bottom to be closed?
  3. Windows manages apps that aren't in use so they don't take up resources?
  4. Someone tried to explain something to you and mentioned Apple.
  5. You're NOT running out of resources

You've really not read what I said.

I don't trust an OS to do memory management of picking and chosing where applications open and close. And for a pretty good reason - they're all uniformally terrible. And it's not just me - Apple have a real problem where they have adopted a similar system, built a UI based on "never having to close apps" and find that users routinely do it anyway, and therefore just hate their UI instead of not doing it.

iOS cannot manage memory. Windows Mobile couldn't manage memory. OSX REALLY couldn't manage memory. The idea Windows 8 has magically cracked it is... dumb.

And so, if you are going to close all applications, for very good reasons, then MS have changed 8.1 to make the UI to do that considerably slower and clumsy, and with no way to revert to the better behaviour. And in doing so have adopted an approach that has already been tried and failed in many other places.
 

Mindwipe

Member
Seriously, what is your problem here? The apps are not wasting your resources and they are out of the way.

The apps are absolutely wasting resources. Clearing them out of memory results in a signficant hit at the time, and the OS will typically not do so until it needs more memory, by which point it's too late and it will actually decrease performance, not increase it.

Same dunderheaded problem happens in iOS - unless you go through and manually kill apps the OS will do it for you half way through a round of Infinity Blade, the framerate will crater and you'll die as a result.
 

Hasney

Member
Just finished installing Windows 8.1 Enterprise on my new SSD and it won't accept my Windows 8 Enterprise key.....

Has anyone successfully been able to use their Windows 8 Enterprise key with Windows 8.1?

You can't use a Windows 8 key with a fresh install of 8.1.

I know, stupid as all hell since it's free to everyone, but there it is. You have to do the inplace upgrade straight from Windows 8 itself.
 
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