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New PC double-take

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40hz:
That said, I don't find 8 so annoying... my main home PC came with it installed (it was an emergency replacement), and once I put a start menu utility on it has behaved much like 7.
-x16wda (May 05, 2013, 08:05 PM)
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Um...have you tried playing a movie on either a DVD or Blu-Ray disk with your new PC yet?  :huh:

That's one "experience" that's very different under Windows 8. :-\

x16wda:
To be honest I don't do much movie watching on my PC, but it came with PowerDVD installed which does the necessary.

On the other hand, I installed Win 8 N edition (sans media code) on my test box, so maybe I'll need to locate the media add-in and give it a spin.

IainB:
Um...have you tried playing a movie on either a DVD or Blu-Ray disk with your new PC yet?  :huh:
That's one "experience" that's very different under Windows 8. :-\
-40hz (May 05, 2013, 09:18 PM)
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Could you elaborate please? I am contemplating a move to Win8, but am a bit reluctant at the moment because Win8 has got pretty bad reviews from some who have already switched.
My Win7-64 Home Premium seems to be pretty much rock-solid and useful.

40hz:
Um...have you tried playing a movie on either a DVD or Blu-Ray disk with your new PC yet?  :huh:
That's one "experience" that's very different under Windows 8. :-\
-40hz (May 05, 2013, 09:18 PM)
--- End quote ---

Could you elaborate please? I am contemplating a move to Win8, but am a bit reluctant at the moment because Win8 has got pretty bad reviews from some who have already switched.
My Win7-64 Home Premium seems to be pretty much rock-solid and useful.
-IainB (May 06, 2013, 05:43 AM)
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Not much need to elaborate. Windows 8 dropped the ability to play such media out of the box. Saved themselves a whole $2 license fee per copy of Windows by taking that capability out.

Now to play a DVD, you'll need to buy the media extensions (i.e. Media Center) which are no longer free to download. Something that can be expensive depending upon which version of Win8 you buy. ($99 for vanilla Win8 since you need to upgrade to the Pro Pack - or $10 if you already bought Pro. I have clients screaming about that every time they find out.) Microsoft even suggests you get third-party software.

The free VLC media player running under Win8 still works for most optical media disks (except encrypted Blue-Ray) although I wonder how much longer that will remain true. Microsoft is an avid supporter of DRM and patents and all things IP. If somebody in the industry seriously squawks about VLC, you can expect Microsoft will do something to prevent apps like that from working under Win8.

A lot pf PC makers are avoiding the whole issue by simply bundling entry-level DVD player software with their hardware. So some (many?) PC buyers (mostly the home version crowd) will never notice the change.

MakeUseOf just had an article published recently that talks about this. Read it here.

I'd stick with W7-64 if I were you. I am - and I have about 20 uninstalled NFS/"internal use only" licenses for Win8 Pro. 8)

f0dder:
Not much need to elaborate. Windows 8 dropped the ability to play such media out of the box. Saved themselves a whole $2 license fee per copy of Windows by taking that capability out.-40hz (May 06, 2013, 11:44 AM)
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Probably a bit more than $2 - anti-competitive lawsuits are costly.

Who uses Windows Media Player anyway, when there's MPC-HC and VLC? :)

The free VLC media player running under Win8 still works for most optical media disks (except encrypted Blue-Ray) although I wonder how much longer that will remain true. Microsoft is an avid supporter of DRM and patents and all things IP. If somebody in the industry seriously squawks about VLC, you can expect Microsoft will do something to prevent apps like that from working under Win8.-40hz (May 06, 2013, 11:44 AM)
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I kinda doubt they have the balls to do that, especially since there's already nice and cheap alternatives that make using pirated content so much easier than attempting to be honest and struggling with getting DRM'ed crap playing.

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