Living With Windows 8, Is It The New Coke of The PC World?

Our office computers are now pushing four.  In business computer land that is an unheard of age.  Weekly crashes and blue screens have been the norm.  Clearly the hardware can’t keep up.  

After a week of looking around, we ended up in the Microsoft store and started to really like the idea of Windows 8 and the instant information on the home screen using “tiles”.  Maybe it should be called Windows Tiles Instead of Windows 8.

Eventually, we were convinced to buy a Windows 7 PC and upgrade to Windows 8 Pro with Media Center.

The initial installation to Windows 8 was the easiest upgrade I had ever done.  Literally just insert DVD , click three agree boxes and off it went.  The PC was a brand new HP AIO with a 23” screen.  The plan was to get a serial adapter and then use a second 22” HP screen we already had.

Not one single glitch or hardware error during the upgrade. Everything appeared to work perfectly.

Setting up email with Windows Live Mail was pretty straight forward.  It did ask if our server was POP or IMAP and then when we chose POP a window appeared that says “Windows Live Mail Does Not Support POP, Please contact your provider for IMAP”.  Why not just say that on the previous screen?  

After setting up the initial screen “Tiles” on Windows 8, we really liked the ability to see a snapshot of your world on one screen.  This is the perfect solution for a kitchen tablet, or shared family PC that isn’t used for work.  Much better than the small screen iPad and since the tiles updated, you always have the latest information, at least that is the idea.  With HP AIO computers starting at just $799 for the touchscreen models, it makes sense to have a 20” tablet in the kitchen for controlling lights and easily reading recipes.

This is also the failing of Windows 8.  Windows 8 might just become the catalyst of change in our office, and not one that Steve Ballmer is going to be happy with. 

Knowing there were major changes to the thought process and operation of Windows 8, I let a lot of things go in my two initial articles about Windows 8.  I assumed the problems I was having were simple user errors and I would learn how to do it right later.

Wrong.

After setting up Mail, the next thing I wanted to set up was our server access.  It took a while but I found a help file article to map network drives.  The “Desktop” tile quickly became my tile of choice.   I couldn’t “Map” any of our music or photo folders on the server to the “libraries” on the PC as I could in Windows 7.  While I was going back and forth between the “desktop” and the “home” screens I noticed the weather wasn’t doing what I expected.

With our old PC’s we had several “gadgets” on the right side displaying time and weather in several cities.  Calling Tony at Renew Services in Indianapolis during a major snowstorm would just be a waste of time.  I set the tile up to monitor five different cities.  Instead it only showed New York, New York weather.  New York wasn’t one of my five choice.

I got sidetracked here and tried the weather channel ap and the weather bug ap, and neither of them would display more than one city.  I expected it to rotate through the cities so in 45 seconds or so I would get to see all of the information.  That didn’t happen.

Since I had a pretty big screen I tried to load several tiles.  Windows 8 wouldn’t let me load the same tile twice.  I could only see the weather in one city without clicking the tile.  WeatherBug said they were working on a fix.  

Back to drive mapping.  In Windows 7 it was a two step process of mapping a drive and then adding the folders in the drive to the library.  In iTunes it was worse.  Again I assumed Apple wants me to buy their toys.

In Windows 8 it can’t be done easily.  At least no way that I found.  Next of course was mapping the photos drive so we would have easy access to them for creating customer websites.   This is where the big problems started.  I still haven’t found media center, even though we bought “Windows 8 Pro with Media Center”.  What we found were tiled versions of pieces of media center, that wouldn’t allow mapping of our server for media access.  I tried the XBox music interface, and no luck there either.

Finally it was time to simply work.  We tried to Upload the latest non-cloud based versions of Office and Expression Web.  We also tried to set up mail.  POP is no longer supported.  

Using iMap we were able to get Windows Live Mail to work.  We couldn’t get mail to tile though, only “fence post”.  I say fence post because it takes a full vertical slice of your screen.  Instead of a 3x3 tile or “window” that can hide behind a word document, mail is displayed as a 3” wide vertical stripe on the screen.  

Even in “desktop” mode, the fence post was all I could figure out.  We couldn’t open a document, two browsers and an email window or tile on one desktop to do basic research and write copy for a web page.  Microsoft has trained us to work this way for 20 years, Apple and UNIX followed suit.  Tiles or “Windows” overlapping on a screen are how most business computers are operated.  It is how screen manufacturers sell bigger screens.

Much of Windows 8 is designed around working in "the cloud".  While I see the "cloud" as a great tool, it is also a scary bet for business.  When there are 4 major accounting software packages, and all the data is on your computers, if your vendors goes under, your company keeps running until you get new software and migrate the data.  With over thirty "cloud" based accounting systems charging monthly fees, what happens when they shut down and your accounting goes with it?  I want my business software on my servers in my office with no service fees.  The cloud is a great backup or mirror service for my data, but not a primary source.

Also I am too cheap to spend $14 every flight to connect.  Why not get all of my email while sitting in the airport on free WiFi and respond while flying, then sync up when I land.  Do we really need to be that connected?

Enough about my thoughts on the cloud.  Eight hours after the box was opened and Windows 8 loaded, we decided that Windows 8 isn’t ready for business.  It was the New Coke of Operating Systems.  We attempted to go back to Windows 7 using the DVD we created in the beginning and the PC failed.  It turns out Window 8 installs easily because it eliminates your ability to go back.  The only way to return to Windows 7 is some command prompt work, formatting hard drives and reloading from a complete set of Windows 7 OEM discs according to the phone support people at HP.  Back in the box it went, and back to the store.

As Apple narrows the price gap with $599 Mac Mini’s packing all the power of a desktop, Microsoft has reason to be concerned.  Apple didn’t make iOS separate from OS X because it was cheaper.  They did it because it is what people need to maximize the devices they have.

As an alternative to Apple OSX for the home, Windows 8 is a great information center.  As a tablet interface, Windows 8 is the best available.  As a phone interface.  Same.  As a PC in a work environment, it hands the keys to Apple, which is where I am going today.  Tomorrow, the Mac Mini will be the first Apple desktop in my office ever.  

Mobile might be growing in leaps and bounds, but desktops still are the foundation of the machine that mobile is built on.  Windows 8 isn’t a foundation, OS X is becoming one quickly.

Act Like The Person You Want To Be

“Act Like The Person You Want To Be” is some great advice or is it?

This is a little phrase I have tried to follow all of my life.  When I was young and wanted to be a Rockstar, I acted like all the Rockstars I saw on MTV.  As I moved into my teens, and decided maybe racing cars would be a great life, I acted like the guys on TV.  

When I joined the military I quickly learned that I didn’t like walking around airplanes as a Security Guard at 2 am in weather so cold my jacket literally turned to ice.  I noticed there were a few guys who had better schedules.  They were the base shooting team.  So, to try and get out of the all night duty, I acted like the guys on the shooting team. 

It didn’t take long before it worked and I was moved off of “guard duty”.  In fact, acting like the other guys on the team got me quickly accepted to the team, and brought a box of awards and medals home that I still don’t have a house big enough for.  That team was a dominant force for four years running.

When I got commissioned as a second lieutenant, I needed to finish college in order to go to Air Force Undergraduate Pilot Training or UPT.  While I was finishing college and waiting to leave for UPT, I hung out in a fighter squadron with F-16 pilots.  Once again I followed the sage advice, and everyone wished me luck when I finally left for UPT.  

At UPT it was a different story.  I was still acting like an F-16 pilot, not like a top student.  My “attitude” landed me a letter that cost me my F-16 slot.  Ironically the letter said “Lt. Bourquin does not have an attitude conducive to flying a fighter.”  

I left UPT to fly a C-26 and spent the next five years as a “wanna be” fighter pilot, in a fighter squadron, hauling people and parts.  I acted like the guys in the squadron and eventually things were looking good I would get that one in a million second shot.  Instead of waiting for a slot at the base I was stationed, I found a reserve squadron in Austin Texas willing to take a chance.  The base was closed before I could even start F-16 School.

The difference in the two scenarios has played out in my life several times and in several different areas.  Do you see the difference?  In simple terms, when I was acting like the person I needed to be in the place and time I was living, I experienced almost effortless success.  When I was acting like the image I wanted to be, I experienced failure no matter how hard I tried.

I wish I could say there was an “epiphany” or “aha moment” where I realized the difference and suddenly my life changed.  Regrettably, I am not that quick.  It took many years and a lot of coaching coupled with self reflection to see the difference.  Now when I talk with someone I can see it in minutes.

As a coach, my most difficult task is to teach people the difference between an image  of a person and the real person.  

I have been blessed with knowing several real “Rockstars”, Race Car Drivers, Actors and CEO’s.  All of them have one common trait.  They act like who they are, not the image people see of them.  It is when they start believing the PR and acting like the image that they fall from grace.

The Rockstar in my neighborhood isn’t currently recording so he built a company.  Most of the day he acts like a hard charging PHD entrepreneur.  That is Poor Hungry and Desperate PHD type by the way.  The rest of the day he still acts like a Rockstar.  He has a full studio in his home and although he’ll never say so, I have met his guitar coach twice just walking by with the dogs.  He is and always will be a Rockstar.  If you followed him all day, you would likely be confused because his lifestyle hardly fits the image you would expect.

The same is true of my Race Car Driver, CEO and Actor friends.  They are always acting like the person they want to be.  Sometimes it is a better version of themselves, other times it is someone who is just above their level.

Who are you acting like?  

If you aren't sure who you want to be check out:

Profile or Page - What Should Your Business Have

As Social Media morphs into it's next phase, Google + and Facebook have a couple of similarities the market is coming to expect.  Simply put, people have profiles, businesses have pages.

So what is the difference.  On Facebook, a profile is supposed to be a website for a single human.  You are limited in how many friends you can have, however you can have a lot of subscribers.  A subscriber is a follower you don't necessarily know.

A page on the other hand is designed for business.  On both Google + and Facebook a page has several business friendly features such as displaying hours, phone numbers and a map in a mobile friendly format.  Every business owner should have a page for their business.  After all they are free.

If you want to know more, check out the book "How To Market On Facebook For Free" or "How To Market On Google + For Free".  Both available as an e-book on Amazon.