Windows 8 upgrade for 39.99

Microsoft is threatening to make an upgrade from XP, Vista, and Win7 to windows 8 for $39.99 as a download.

http://windowsteamblog.com/windows/b/bloggingwindows/archive/2012/07/02/upgrade-to-windows-8-pro-for-39-99.aspx


The product will include Media Center. You will need to buy your own turkey baster.

The price of the downgrade back to your earlier version has not been announced.

Even if they offered to PAY ME $39.99 I wouldn't do it. I've seen the preview of W8 and I hate it with a flippin passion. The GUI looks like it was designed by Fisher-Price !!!
 
 
 
 
 
 
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I have the consumer preview as a second boot and although I don't care for the metro style, getting to the standard desktop is one click away, so I'll upgrade.

Just like the X1 adventures when they first introduced their new UI experience.  It will take some time to get comfortable with any new experience.

Although to be fair, if your current system is working fine and you can create music  then there is no need to upgrade at this time. 

Tom

Looking at that site, it does not appear to be a Microsoft site.  Also its stated you have to buy the Win 8 from a non-Microsoft site so I wonder how legitimate this is???

tyacko


I have the consumer preview as a second boot and although I don't care for the metro style, getting to the standard desktop is one click away, so I'll upgrade.

Just like the X1 adventures when they first introduced their new UI experience.  It will take some time to get comfortable with any new experience.

Although to be fair, if your current system is working fine and you can create music  then there is no need to upgrade at this time. 

Tom

I am using Vista and I know I am giving up performance points relative to Win7. Now Noel et al point to potentially more significant performance improvements relative to Win7 - 
http://blog.cakewalk.com/windows-8-a-benchmark-for-music-production-applications/

As much as I hate the thought of upgrading and re-installing/re-authorizing all of my plug-ins, I think it is (past) time.
The only questions are:
1) (rhetorical) Is it also time to do a hardware update to avoid the same pain in a year or two?
2) I am also wondering about the feasibility of doing the upgrade "non-clean". In the past I have only every done an OS upgrade as part of a clean system over-haul. Is it reasonable to expect that I could just upgrade (in my case from Vista) to Windows 8 without losing my current installs and authorizations?

Is it reasonable to expect that I could just upgrade (in my case from Vista) to Windows 8 without losing my current installs and authorizations?

Seems pretty unlikely. The blogger seems to be saying you can only port applications from Windows 8, and some of those authorizations might not even survive that. By their nature, authorization schemes are designed to defeat portability.


" You will be able to upgrade from any consumer edition of Windows 7 to Windows 8 Pro and bring everything along which includes your Windows settings, personal files, and apps. If you are upgrading from Windows Vista, you will be able to bring along your Windows settings and personal files, and if you are upgrading from Windows XP you will only be able to bring along your personal files."


I would be happy if it would just let me revert to an older version if it is as bad as it looks. I am a bit su****ious that the helpful installation genie from Microsoft.com will be designed to be good and certain that your existing license (if not the files needed to revert) is killed in the process of upgrading. There does seem to be an option to download an iso and install from that however.


This cheap upgrade is presently set to expire at the end of January 2013, so early adopters will take the brunt of
 the offer. 

Geeze; the nanny bot on this forum thinks s u s p i c i o u s is a way of hiding a naughty word. Good thing you can use LOL instead of s****. s n i g g e r

OK someone at Cw has been playing with Win8 and it has not so far been found to be the turd-on-a-stick one might  expect from MS attempting to bring the world of the smart phone to the desktop.

http://blog.cakewalk.com/windows-8-a-benchmark-for-music-production-applications/?utm_source=bronto&utm_medium=email&utm_term=Cakewalk+Blog&utm_content=SONAR+X1+performance+in+Windows+8+vs+Windows+7+-+And+more+on+the+Cakewalk+Blog&utm_campaign=July+5+2012+-+SONAR+X1

fireberd


I didn't recognize it, the "windowsteam" didn't ring a bell.

LOL, nor with me I had to double-check after you mentioned it.

Beagle

bapu


All things considered I'll prolly buy the upgrade and let it sit in the virtual cupboard (HDD) for year before I install it. I did that with Windows 7.

so...you're gonna pay for it but not install it?  sounds familiar...

Only to wait out the issues.


I imagine that some time in the future the $40 upgrade will actually cost $140. Buying now is "wise" spending, no? 

Reading some comments on the new Windows 8 online installation system (the technology for delivering the 39.99 Win 8 Pro offer, and maybe a full replacement for the sale of an upgrade DVD) that are raising some questions. If I am reading this right, the online installation is customized specifically to the machine and Windows version that you are upgrading, including only selected files for that specific machine,  and the option to burn a backup DVD/ISO is for that specific customized installation only. That would probably make the backup DVD useless to use on another machine. I expect that this will make the well-known hacks to clean install with upgrade media a thing of the past. But it may also make the option to buy a cheap upgrade and wait to install it until later unworkable. If the offer is linked to the requirement to not only buy but also install (thus destroying your current version and its activation key) before the time limit on the offer ends,  then it may be a case of forcing you to adopt the new OS now.

That would solve a couple of MS previous version launch problems: the reluctance to accept the first version of an  upgrade as with Vista, and the end run around new retail pricing via the upgrade media cheat. It remains to be seen how MS would allow you to move a legitimate upgrade copy of Windows 8 to a new computer if the old machine died. The easy way out is to make the upgrade license non-transferable (tied to the machine it was first installed on) like the current OEM license. Or they could just let you use your upgrade license number (or a new one obtained by telephone to the activation line) to feed their online installer to get your new machine a clean install.

The commentators I have been reading seem to think that the new model for MS will be to sell a license number and access to an online installer, and stop publishing DVD's at all--at least for upgrades. So we may be looking at a quite different marketing and installation system than with the Windows 7 half price DVD pre-order. One that can give MS a lot more (and the user a lot less) control over how and when to upgrade--at least on the basis of cheap upgrade offers.