Recommended Posts

I know this is old news, but this remains my greatest concern for Windows 8. Unless you have an enterprise license or are a developer, you will not be able to sideload Metro apps on Windows 8.

Yeah... so I guess most consumers don't really care - but I don't want to see Microsoft controlling the entire app ecosystem. I would like to see other stores spring up. I want to run whatever I want, from what source I get it from, on my computer, and Microsoft should not disallow that. These moves towards centralization are destroying whatever last bit of credibility Windows has of being a semi-open platform.

I am fearful for the future of Windows, UI issues with Metro not withstanding.

  • Like 4

You can sideload apps if you install the (free) Visual Studio Express. The average user probably doesn't want to sideload, so it's appropriate that you'd need dev tools to do it.

What you're suggesting would turn Windows 8 into Android, and that's the last thing I'd want to see.

You can sideload apps if you install the (free) Visual Studio Express. The average user probably doesn't want to sideload, so it's appropriate that you'd need dev tools to do it.

What you're suggesting would turn Windows 8 into Android, and that's the last thing I'd want to see.

Sorry but you can install any app you want on Windows now so how is this anything like Android ?

You can sideload apps if you install the (free) Visual Studio Express. The average user probably doesn't want to sideload, so it's appropriate that you'd need dev tools to do it.

What you're suggesting would turn Windows 8 into Android, and that's the last thing I'd want to see.

Windows 8 is a DESKTOP COMPUTER OS... as crappy as its UI is for Desktop computers.. it's not a Tablet OS or a Phone OS. You should not be locked down when it comes to a desktop OS.

Windows 8 is a DESKTOP COMPUTER OS... as crappy as its UI is for Desktop computers.. it's not a Tablet OS or a Phone OS. You should not be locked down when it comes to a desktop OS.

Microsoft are the ones who've done a great deal defining what a desktop OS is in the modern age anyway, and they'll probably continue to do so going forward :p Desktop apps are still la free-for-all on installing, but part of the entire Metro experience is ensuring a safe, worry free environment for running programs - something which is going to benefit a lot of computer users. Which Microsoft don't think you can do with side loading and skirting the approval process - for obvious reasons.

If you want to side load, there are ways with a developer license, or just using good old fashioned desktop apps. But I can't see them allowing side loading Metro apps for the general populace anytime soon.

The average user probably doesn't want to sideload, so it's appropriate that you'd need dev tools to do it.

But what if someone finds out about this great app on the internet & they really want it only to find out they can't get it on the App Store?

Windows 8 is a DESKTOP COMPUTER OS... as crappy as its UI is for Desktop computers.. it's not a Tablet OS or a Phone OS. You should not be locked down when it comes to a desktop OS.

Well, technically it's mostly a Tablet PC OS, (as opposed to an iPad-like tablet OS,) but, yeah, I guess...

Well, technically it's mostly a Tablet PC OS, (as opposed to an iPad-like tablet OS,) but, yeah, I guess...

It's a tablet OS that is from the Family of Desktop OS's (Windows). It's the next iteration of Windows, not it's own new family. Like MacOS Vs. iOS, Chrome OS vs Android.

You can sideload apps if you install the (free) Visual Studio Express. The average user probably doesn't want to sideload, so it's appropriate that you'd need dev tools to do it.

What you're suggesting would turn Windows 8 into Android, and that's the last thing I'd want to see.

You don't actually need VS Express - you can type "Show-WindowsDeveloperLicenseRegistration" into a Powershell prompt

Windows 8 is a DESKTOP COMPUTER OS... as crappy as its UI is for Desktop computers.. it's not a Tablet OS or a Phone OS. You should not be locked down when it comes to a desktop OS.

I agree entirely. I didn't spend ?1200 on hardware for Microsoft to tell me what is and isn't OK to run on it.

Granted, as of now people can install normal desktop apps, but it's clear Microsoft are pushing RT very hard to be the primary platform of choice for applications in Windows, and as far as I'm concerned no company should be dictating what I can and cannot install onto my hardware. That's why I refused to buy a Windows or iOS phone, and it's why even if I do start using Windows 8 I'm likely to stay away from RT as much as possible.

  • Like 1

Microsoft are the ones who've done a great deal defining what a desktop OS is in the modern age anyway, and they'll probably continue to do so going forward

Time for me to change profession ...

You should not be locked down when it comes to a desktop OS.

How about we talk about a real sh*tty change:

I bet everyone cried even more when they were house trained.

Sorry, meant "potty trained".

Such a radical shift in paradigm and thought process....

Mind-blowing... arse affecting....

And how did that work out?

.

How about we talk about a real sh*tty change:

I bet everyone cried even more when they were house trained.

Sorry, meant "potty trained".

Such a radical shift in paradigm and thought process....

Mind-blowing... arse affecting....

And how did that work out?

.

Crappy, I have to go out of my way to be in the right place to releive myself. I need to hold it until it's appropriate. I can't just go when I want, where I want.

Crappy, I have to go out of my way to be in the right place to releive myself. I need to hold it until it's appropriate. I can't just go when I want, where I want.

Are you complaining about not being able to crap your shorts when you want and no one there to clean up after you?

Maybe you should move to San Francisco. It's legal there.

Wouldn't change the fact Windows 8 is being treated less and less like a desktop OS, yet it is a desktop OS in terms of family.

No. It's an interactive operating system with the ability to be used as a traditional desktop system, if the family requires.

Do we need to rehash the same tired arguments over and over? I don't get some of you, you moan that you hate metro and don't wnat to use it and now you also turn around and moan that you hate how the marketplace is "locked down" and you can't side load metro apps which you don't even want to use in the first place? Which is it ffs?

The desktop is open, install whatever you want on it, it's not going away anytime soon, Win9 will have a desktop and support Win32 apps, so will Windows 10 I bet. Since MS is running and managing the store, it sets the rules for apps, it's only logical. Now if after RTM someone makes a sideloading metro app tool then great, but the benefits, specially on Windows, are worth the trade off for many many people out there who somehow manage to totally screw over their systems because they installed x app without knowing better and had it **** all over the place.

  • Like 1

Do we need to rehash the same tired arguments over and over? I don't get some of you, you moan that you hate metro and don't wnat to use it and now you also turn around and moan that you hate how the marketplace is "locked down" and you can't side load metro apps which you don't even want to use in the first place? Which is it ffs?

The desktop is open, install whatever you want on it, it's not going away anytime soon, Win9 will have a desktop and support Win32 apps, so will Windows 10 I bet. Since MS is running and managing the store, it sets the rules for apps, it's only logical. Now if after RTM someone makes a sideloading metro app tool then great, but the benefits, specially on Windows, are worth the trade off for many many people out there who somehow manage to totally screw over their systems because they installed x app without knowing better and had it **** all over the place.

Exactly.

  • Like 1

No. It's an interactive operating system with the ability to be used as a traditional desktop system, if the family requires.

Interesting !!! But I think you forgot business who generally don't want or need an interactive operating system.

Interesting !!! But I think you forgot business who generally don't want or need an interactive operating system.

Unless business wants a tablet for it's work right? And then they can write business specific metro apps for those tablets and side load them and manage/update them on their own etc etc. Sure metro and the start screen is more for casual media consumption etc but there's nothing to stop a business from buying a number of Win8/WinRT tablets and then writing some of their apps over to it so they can be used without issue via touch etc.

This topic is now closed to further replies.
  • Recently Browsing   0 members

    • No registered users viewing this page.
  • Posts

    • Who is paying for this 30x scale-up? Its sounds expensive.
    • Millions of users to benefit from Windows 11's new performance boost on Adobe Photoshop by Sayan Sen Despite the advent of AI-generated imagery, Adobe's Photoshop remains one of the most popular tools on this planet. Adobe does not have a publicly reported total user count but it's probably not wrong to assume there are millions. As of 2025, Adobe Creative Cloud has had approximately 41 million paid subscribers, many of whom likely use Photoshop. In addition, more than 166,000 companies worldwide are apparently also using the app. These figures are according to a very recent report by SQ Magazine. Out of them, it is fair to assume that many are probably running Windows. As such, there is good news for these users as Microsoft has announced Photoshop is getting a big 20% performance boost on x86-64 (AMD64) systems and a 13% bump-up on Arm devices. This is definitely great news for them as many have complained about the slow performance and general sluggishness of Photoshop on Windows 11 ever since the advent of the latter back in 2021. If you are wondering how Microsoft managed to do this, the answer lies in a combination of compiler-level optimizations and a technology called Sample Profile Guided Optimization (SPGO). According to Microsoft, Adobe worked closely with the company’s Visual C++ team and adopted the latest MSVC toolchain enhancements together with SPGO to squeeze more performance out of Photoshop’s CPU-bound workloads. Unlike traditional Profile Guided Optimization (PGO), which requires developers to create special instrumented builds and run lengthy training workloads, SPGO gathers performance data directly from optimized release binaries. This means Adobe could collect real-world usage information which gives a major advantage to this technique, as companies could leverage data collected from actual customer workloads rather than only relying on synthetic benchmark runs. In theory, this should allow optimizations to better reflect how users interact with software in the real world. Thanks to this, there are improvements to code layout, function inlining, hot-and-cold code separation, and other low-level tweaks that help processors execute instructions more efficiently. Essentially the compiler is better able to identify “hot” code paths, those which are most frequently executed, and optimize them accordingly.
    • "The 2TB Samsung 990 PRO NVMe SSD hits lowest price in over three months¨ I'd prefer to see the lowest price in over a year
    • Glad these prices are starting to come down, but that is still crazy. I bought the 2TB 9100 Pro (slightly more expensive version with PCIe 5.0) last year for $240.
    • The 2TB Samsung 990 PRO NVMe SSD hits lowest price in over three months by Sayan Sen Yesterday, we covered a really good deal wherein you can get a 4TB TeamGroup T-FORCE G50 NVMe PCIe Gen4 SSD for a low price of just $400 with a special discount coupon. That's just $100 per TB, making it a very good offer during these hard times. The deal is still live, so you can check it out in its dedicated article here if you do not want to miss out. Meanwhile, if you don't have that kind of budget but still wish to buy an SSD for a good price, the 2TB variant of the TeamGroup SSD at $280 its lowest price in over three months. Meanwhile, those seeking 2TB but faster performance can check out Samsung's 990 PRO, which has hit the lowest price also in the last quarter or so, as it's on sale for $370 (purchase links under the specs table down below). Thus, you want a faster drive, get the 990 Pro, or you want more capacity, grab the TeamGroup 4TB linked in the first para. The 990 PRO is a PCIe Gen4 NVMe SSD and still one of the fastest drives available today for under $500. Speaking of fast, sequential reads and writes are rated at 7450 MB/s and 6900 MB/s, respectively. The random throughputs for reads and writes are 1400K IOPS and 1550K IOPS, respectively. The 990 PRO is based on Samsung's 7th Gen V-NAND flash, and it too is TLC. It packs 2 gigs of LPDDR4 DRAM cache, which helps the random performance. The endurance rating for this is 1200 TBW (terabytes written), which should be sufficient for most users. The Samsung 990 PRO is compatible with the PlayStation 5, but if you are going to use the 990 PRO on a PC, check out the Samsung Magician app that lets you track your drive's health, update its firmware, customize various settings, and more. The tech specs are given below: Specification TeamGroup T-FORCE G50 2TB Samsung 990 PRO 2TB Interface PCIe 4.0 x4, NVMe 1.4 PCIe Gen 4.0 x4, NVMe 2.0 Form Factor M.2 2280 M.2 2280 Controller InnoGrit Controller Samsung In-house Controller NAND Flash 3D TLC 3D TLC DRAM Cache None (HMB supported) 2GB LPDDR4 Sequential Read (Max) 5,000 MB/s 7,450 MB/s Sequential Write (Max) 4,500 MB/s 6,900 MB/s Random Read (4K) Up to 600,000 IOPS Up to 1,400,000 IOPS Random Write (4K) Up to 700,000 IOPS Up to 1,550,000 IOPS TBW (Endurance) 1,300 TBW 1,200 TBW MTBF 3,000,000 hours 1,500,000 hours Operating Temperature 0°C to 70°C 0°C to 70°C Storage Temperature -40°C to 85°C -40°C to 85°C Shock Resistance 1,500G / 0.5ms 1,500G / 0.5ms Heatsink Patented Graphene Heat Spreader No Get them at the links below: Samsung 990 PRO SSD 2TB (MZ-V9P2T0B/AM): $369.99 (Sold and Shipped by Amazon US) TEAMGROUP T-Force G50 2TB SSD (TM8FFE002T0C129): $279.99 (Sold by TeamGroup, Shipped by Amazon US) Good to know This Amazon deal is U.S. specific, and not available in other regions unless specified. We only use first-party seller links (at the time of article publishing); ensure that you purchase from a first-party seller link only. Check out Today's Deals on Amazon | or our recent tech deals. Become a Prime member (for Students or SNAP) via Neowin Get Prime Access - Prime for half price (for qualifying Medicaid, EBT, SNAP) Subscribe to Prime Video, Audible Plus, Music Unlimited or Kindle Unlimited via Neowin As an Amazon Associate, we earn from qualifying purchases.
  • Recent Achievements

    • First Post
      Jocimo earned a badge
      First Post
    • Week One Done
      suprememobiles48 earned a badge
      Week One Done
    • One Month Later
      Windows Guy earned a badge
      One Month Later
    • One Month Later
      Prasann earned a badge
      One Month Later
    • Week One Done
      Prasann earned a badge
      Week One Done
  • Popular Contributors

    1. 1
      +primortal
      519
    2. 2
      +Edouard
      174
    3. 3
      PsYcHoKiLLa
      90
    4. 4
      Steven P.
      81
    5. 5
      ATLien_0
      70
  • Tell a friend

    Love Neowin? Tell a friend!