Why is the Windows 8 theme so ugly?

[13Gigatons]

How did this god awful theme make it out the door. I especially hate it when it goes all white when your not focused on a window. I swear Microsoft isn't even trying anymore.

Anybody recommend a good theme for Windows 8?

 

[SlitheryDee]

I never noticed any whiteness. I can't stand not having a start menu though. The metro interface is crap for a desktop.

 

[Vdubchaos]

They are following the latest trends. "Tables/phones" are hot and dub step is the shiznit.

MS really couldn't disappoint me any more than this crap....

Clear that marketing has more influence than actual innovation/developers at MS hehe

 

[lxskllr]

Look at the source, and change it as you like. Oh, wait...

I guess bend over and take it is your option :^D

 

[zCypher]

Look at the source, and change it as you like. Oh, wait...

I guess bend over and take it is your option :^D

i lol'd

but seriously, try

http://windows.microsoft.com/is-is/windows/themes
http://themesforwindows8.org/
http://www.windows-8-theme.org/

just google win8 themes. personally, i'm ok with mine the way it looks.

 

[darkewaffle]

The default Win8 theme is quite nice imo. Kicks the crap out of Aero at any rate, I don't know what people see in that; first time I use any Win7 box I turn it off. I find I have to do far less customization post-install to make Win8 look nice than I do with Win7.

 

[Arkaign]

The default Win8 theme is quite nice imo. Kicks the crap out of Aero at any rate, I don't know what people see in that; first time I use any Win7 box I turn it off. I find I have to do far less customization post-install to make Win8 look nice than I do with Win7.

Heh, do you have eyes? I'm the total opposite, I can't stand the ancient bland solid color blocky look of Win8. Looks like Win95 with a bit of 3.1 in there. I can get it to work how I want it, but it takes 3rd party software and a decent bit of tweaking.

 

[Number1]

The default Win8 theme is quite nice imo. Kicks the crap out of Aero at any rate, I don't know what people see in that; first time I use any Win7 box I turn it off. I find I have to do far less customization post-install to make Win8 look nice than I do with Win7.

In win7, aero is an option for those who like it. It's not available in win8 and you call that progress?

 

[dighn]

Heh, do you have eyes? I'm the total opposite, I can't stand the ancient bland solid color blocky look of Win8. Looks like Win95 with a bit of 3.1 in there. I can get it to work how I want it, but it takes 3rd party software and a decent bit of tweaking.

the theme looks great imo, especially after you do a registry hack that makes the window borders thinner. it's a clean, no-nonsense look that doesn't distract from what's really important. if you look closely it's also a lot more refined than what you had in previous windows versions. after using Windows 8 for a while, Aero/Glass is starting to look dated and quaint at best. Metro still blows though.

 

[JEDI]

How did this god awful theme make it out the door. I especially hate it when it goes all white when your not focused on a window. I swear Microsoft isn't even trying anymore.

Anybody recommend a good theme for Windows 8?

havent u learned man?
skip every other version

Win98,WinMillenium, Winxp,vista,win7,win8,win9

 

[darkewaffle]

In win7, aero is an option for those who like it. It's not available in win8 and you call that progress?

You associate aesthetics with progress?

 

[techs]

I believe MS wants the old desktop to look clunky since they are trying to entice people to their new "apps" environment.

As to the lack of Aero I wonder if its to maximize battery life on Surface Pro's while keeping the interface identical to desktop and laptops.

 

[Arkaign]

This says it all fairly well :

http://www.nngroup.com/articles/windows-8-disappointing-usability/

There is basically zero reason to go from 7 to 8, and a pretty large number of negatives. Enterprise is avoiding it like the plague.

 

[HeXen]

I like win8 just fine. I always hated the start menu and it's tree structure containing sub folders along with each programs uninstaller, IE links..etc. On the start screen it's just the shortcut to the app itself and can be arranged into groups and is very easy to see quickly.

 

[Ketchup]

Used it for a little bit. On the main screen I felt like I was using windows 3.1 with better pics and higher resolution.

 

[ControlD]

This says it all fairly well :

http://www.nngroup.com/articles/windows-8-disappointing-usability/

There is basically zero reason to go from 7 to 8, and a pretty large number of negatives. Enterprise is avoiding it like the plague.

Yes, but enterprise is just starting to move to Windows 7 in many (probably most) cases. It isn't that surprising that most businesses aren't going to jump to Windows 8 at this point. If they follow the XP to Win7 route, we should be looking at Windows 11 or 12 for the next enterprise upgrade.

I am convinced that MS knew this would be a test product used mainly by home users.

 

[Arkaign]

Yes, but enterprise is just starting to move to Windows 7 in many (probably most) cases. It isn't that surprising that most businesses aren't going to jump to Windows 8 at this point. If they follow the XP to Win7 route, we should be looking at Windows 11 or 12 for the next enterprise upgrade.

I am convinced that MS knew this would be a test product used mainly by home users.

That sounds reasonable. At least Win8 is a brave product, and shows they're thinking hard about the way people may be using computing devices in the coming years. I don't really like it very much personally, but it could lead to good things.

 

[Hugo Drax]

How did this god awful theme make it out the door. I especially hate it when it goes all white when your not focused on a window. I swear Microsoft isn't even trying anymore.

Anybody recommend a good theme for Windows 8?

Remember windows 8 is designed for very low hardware so they limit the colors to 16 colors for windows and simple bitblit operations

 

[Ketchup]

Remember windows 8 is designed for very low hardware so they limit the colors to 16 colors for windows and simple bitblit operations

Which points out the underlying stupidity of Microsoft with this OS. They should have made a separate version for touch screens/non-touch.

 

[Hugo Drax]

Which points out the underlying stupidity of Microsoft with this OS. They should have made a separate version for touch screens/non-touch.

Remember the way the Microsoft is structured with Ballmer at the helm is the "Windows anywhere" philosophy.

The first attempt was shoehorn windows everywhere, into tablets,etc.. and it failed since no one wanted to run a desktop UI on a tablet device.

So Ballmer figured, if plan A failed. then try the "Windows everywhere" initiative, but take the reverse course and shoehorn the tablet on the desktop.

So you cut down the requirements down to EGA level for all devices, including workstations with 100Gigaflop capacity.

The other issue is Windows still has lots of cruft and spaghetti code from years of layering shit on top of the old in order to support Windows 2.1 286/386 applications. So you end up with a cruddy non object oriented API based on win16, all they did was extend it to 64 bit but it all ties back to win16.

Even WinRT still has to sit on top of the antiquated Win32 API in in order to function.

So unfortunately due to such an inefficient structure, they have to dumb down the OS in order for it to scale down to tablets. Which means according to Microsoft even high end desktops get the tablet treatment.


Unlike OS X which can scale to two different environments, Darwin and Cocoa scale nicely down to the phone level.

The Microsoft Behemoth with decades of legacy cruft requires lots of hacks to work on tablets.

 

[HeXen]

Which points out the underlying stupidity of Microsoft with this OS. They should have made a separate version for touch screens/non-touch.

I think the point is having familiarity regardless of what device you have. Along with communication and sharing between devices.
Like i could pick up an Iphone, ipod touch and it's familiar to me since i have the ipad, but if i were to pick up an Imac, i venture into unfamiliar territory. To people out there that don't want to learn anything but the simplest and quickest routines, that could be a big deal which explains all the PC retards out there and lack of Linux adoption among desktops.

All Metro is really is just a shortcut pop out and it is faster to see larger icons with text using the whole screen as apposed to fewer and smaller icons constrained in a small area of the screen. Had to add a shutdown icon and some others for speed and simplicity as some of those things could have been better thought out for desktop users but it's no biggie considering everyone customizes their OS to some degree.

Clicking only start with no further clicks, i see 45 icons in Windows 8 with room for quite a few more..that's not even scrolling, just what i immediately see. Start in Windows 7 i saw around 10 depending what limit it's set to show. It does make a difference once you get used to it. I now have faster access to many more applications than i would otherwise have, plus i don't have to focus my eyes to a smaller area of screen space, it's just bam, 45+ icons with larger text in my face with less visual hunting.

 

[Red Squirrel]

Honestly I've always hated the themes since XP. XP was easy to turn off and one of the first things I do when I instal XP. Vista/7 I'm not a fan of either, and I disable it. Can the 8 one be disabled too or did they get rid of Windows classic? 2000 was probably the best theme. Simple, elegant, functional.

 

[HeXen]

Honestly I've always hated the themes since XP. XP was easy to turn off and one of the first things I do when I instal XP. Vista/7 I'm not a fan of either, and I disable it. Can the 8 one be disabled too or did they get rid of Windows classic? 2000 was probably the best theme. Simple, elegant, functional.

Not without 3rd party like classicshell. Though you can easily make it bland or plain colors and high contrasts are still there.

 

[agharta]

Remember windows 8 is designed for very low hardware so they limit the colors to 16 colors for windows and simple bitblit operations

Even mobile phones can easily handle 16 bit or higher bit depth colours so there’s no technical reason to limit an interface to 16 colours.

The other issue is Windows still has lots of cruft and spaghetti code from years of layering shit on top of the old in order to support Windows 2.1 286/386 applications. So you end up with a cruddy non object oriented API based on win16, all they did was extend it to 64 bit but it all ties back to win16.

Microsoft merged the consumer line with the workstation line with XP.
With 32 bit versions of XP or later 16 bit applications are run in a subsystem.
With 64 bit versions of Windows 32 bit application are also run in a subsystem.
What you describe is more akin to the massive kludge that was Windows 95 – ME.

 

[Rhonda the Sly]

What's with all this talk of 16 colors or 16-bit colors? Windows still uses the same 32-bit color depth as always.